Vlasov, Andrey Andreevich

Most of the information about Vlasov’s life before the German captivity was received from his friends and like-minded people who met him after the start of the Great Patriotic War or during his stay in captivity, when Vlasov became the ideological leader of the Russian liberation movement. The memories they left are based on Vlasov’s own stories ^[7] .

Vlasov was born on September 1 (14), 1901 (according to autobiographical questionnaire data on August 19 ( September 1 ) ^[8] ) in the village of Lomakino, Gaginsky volost, Sergach district, Nizhny Novgorod province (now Gaginsky district, Nizhny Novgorod region ). Russian He was the thirteenth child, the youngest son. The family lived in poverty, which prevented the father from fulfilling his desire to give all his children an education. Andrey had to pay his elder brother Ivan, who sent his brother to receive a religious education in the Nizhny Novgorod seminary . The seminary was interrupted by the 1917 revolution . In 1918, Andrei went to study as an agronomist, but in 1919 he was drafted into the Red Army ^[7] .

In the ranks of the Red Army before the start of World War II

In the Red Army since 1919 ^[7] . After completing a four-month command course, he became a platoon commander and participated in battles with the Armed Forces of the South of Russia on the Southern Front . He served in the 2nd Don Division. At the end of the liquidation of the white forces in the North Caucasus, the division in which Vlasov served was transferred to Northern Tavria against the troops of Wrangel . Vlasov was appointed company commander, then transferred to headquarters. At the end of 1920, a detachment in which Vlasov commanded horse and foot reconnaissance was transferred to liquidate the rebel movement led by Nestor Makhno ^[7] .

Since 1922, Vlasov held command and staff positions, as well as teaching. In 1929 he graduated from the Higher Army Command Course "Shot" . In 1930 he joined the CPSU (b) . In 1935 he became a student of the Military Academy named after M.V. Frunze . The historian A.N. Kolesnik claimed that in 1937-1938 Vlasov was a member of the tribunal of the Leningrad and Kiev military districts. During this time, the tribunal did not pronounce a single acquittal ^[9] . Since August 1937 - the commander of the 133rd Infantry Regiment of the 72nd Infantry Division , and since April 1938 - the assistant commander of this division.

In the fall of 1938, he was sent to China to work as part of a group of military advisers, which indicates full confidence in Vlasov from the political leadership ^[7] . From May to November 1939, he served as chief military adviser. In parting, before leaving China, Chiang Kai-shek was awarded the Order of the Golden Dragon , Chiang Kai-shek's wife Sun Meiling gave Vlasov a watch. Both the order and the clock were taken away by the authorities from Vlasov upon their return to the USSR ^[7] .

In the book of O. F. Souvenir, “The Tragedy of the Red Army 1937-38”, the following is stated: “Former commander of the 99th SD after returning from China A. A. Vlasov was again sent to the 99th, this time for inspection. The connection turned out to be advanced, but there were also shortcomings: the commander intensively studied the tactics of military operations of the Wehrmacht. Vlasov wrote a “report” on this fact. After that, the commander was arrested, and Vlasov was soon appointed in his place. ”

In January 1940, Major General Vlasov was appointed commander of the 99th Rifle Division . The division was stationed directly on the border in the Przemysl region, where future opponents were in front of each other. Vlasov drew the attention of the division’s command staff to how Germans look disciplined, even in the smallest detail, and how lax, if not more so, their division. He demanded and ensured strict implementation of the charter in the division, as a result of which the division was awarded the Red Banner in October of that year and recognized as the best division in the Kiev Military District ^[10] . Marshal Tymoshenko called the division the best in the entire Red Army. For this A. Vlasov was awarded a golden watch and the Order of the Red Banner . The newspaper "Red Star" published an article about Vlasov, praising his military abilities, his attention and care for his subordinates, the accurate and thorough performance of his duties ^[7] . It should be noted that at the beginning of the war, the division, already without Vlasov, was among the few that showed decent and organized resistance to the enemy, and was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for this.

In an autobiography written in April 1940 and compiled according to the established standard, he noted: “I had no hesitation. Always stood firmly on the general line of the party and always fought for it ” ^[11] .

In January 1941, Vlasov was appointed commander of the 4th mechanized corps of the Kiev Special Military District, and a month later he was awarded the Order of Lenin .

In the initial period of World War II

The war for Vlasov began near Lviv , where he served as commander of the 4th mechanized corps . He was thanked for his skillful actions, and on the recommendation of N. S. Khrushchev ^{[12] he} was appointed commander of the 37th Army , defending Kiev . After encircling the troops of the Southwestern Front on September 15, 1941, disparate formations of this army managed to break through to the east, and Vlasov himself was wounded and ended up in a hospital.

One of the participants of the defense of Kiev and the future Hero of the Soviet Union Arefiev K.A. left unique memories of General Vlasov in the last days of the fighting in the Kiev encirclement. In September 1941, Arefyev served as chief of staff of the Kiev armored train "Liter A" . He participated in unsuccessful attempts of the 37th army to break out of the Kiev encirclement at Baryshevka and Berezani . With the failure of the armored train, Arefyev joined the combined combat group under the personal command of Major General A. Vlasov, who was in the swampy floodplain of the Trubezh River in the vicinity of the villages of Glanyshev - Pristromy ^[13] :

... During the night we walked 8 kilometers. The commander of the detachment was Pankov, and the commissar was Golovanev. The maps were old; only large forests were shown on them. We approached the swamp, the conductor said that you can cross it and the forest behind it. Crossed through a swamp, pulling each other out. We went into the forest, and it turned out that we were on an island on which there were already many retreating. More dry land was brought to him by horses and somewhere around 50 heads of cattle ...

On this island with an area of ​​about 4 square kilometers was General Vlasov. We sat on it for 6 days ...

On October 1, intelligence was sent for the last time. The exit was forbidden by Vlasov, who said that before going, it was necessary to do reconnaissance and we would go out in an organized manner (even in the first days of our stay on the island of Vlasov, officers assembled for a meeting).

On the 7th day of October 2, a boy of about fourteen sailed in a boat and brought a clock and a message saying that the Germans were offering to give up ... We decided not to give up and write the Germans a provocative letter ...

At 3 o’clock, as the Germans warned us, hurricane fire rained down on the island from four sides, which went from 3 o’clock in the afternoon until 6 p.m. Pankov, Golovanev, a journalist for a military newspaper, and another 6 people from armored trains were killed.

At 10 pm we decided to leave. Vlasov ordered me to take command of the first group and move to the railway, but I headed south-east ... Since there were a lot of people, I sent forward a group of 25 people with machine guns, 3 machine guns and rifles. Next came the rest of the group, led by me. The others followed us ...

The first group walked about 15 meters from us, Finogenov commanded it. They walked from 10 pm to 7 am, but only a mile and a half passed, as they walked through the swamp, jumping from hummock to hummock. We went to the forest, no one was shelling the forest.

As you can see, A. A. Vlasov at that stage remained faithful to the oath and tried to withdraw his subordinates from the circle in an organized group.

In November 1941, Stalin called Vlasov and ordered him to form the 20th Army , which would be part of the Western Front and defend the capital .

On December 5, in the area of ​​the village of Krasnaya Polyana (32 km from the Moscow Kremlin), the Soviet 20th Army under the command of General Vlasov stopped parts of the German 4th Panzer Army , making a significant contribution to the victory near Moscow. In Soviet times, a documented unfounded and unreliable version appeared that Vlasov himself was in the hospital at that time, and the military operations were led by either the commander of the operational group A. I. Lizyukov or the chief of staff L. M. Sandalov ^[14] .

Overcoming the stubborn resistance of the enemy, the 20th Army knocked out the Germans from Solnechnogorsk and Volokolamsk . On December 13, 1941, the Sovinformburo published an official report on the repulsion of the German offensive near Moscow and printed in it photographs of those commanders who distinguished themselves especially in the defense of the capital. Among them was Vlasov. The message was printed in the central Soviet newspapers — Pravda and Izvestia — and reprinted in many local newspapers ^[15] . January 24, 1942 for these battles Vlasov was awarded the Order of the Red Banner and promoted to lieutenant general ^[7] . His image appears in the American version of the documentary “ The rout of German troops near Moscow ” ^[16] , which won the Oscar in 1943.

Zhukov assessed Vlasov’s actions as follows ^[14] : “Personally, Lieutenant General Vlasov is well prepared in operational terms, he has organizational skills. With the command and control of the copes. "

After successes near Moscow, Vlasov in the army, following Stalin, is called “the savior of Moscow” ^[17] . On the instructions of the Main Political Administration about Vlasov, a book is being written entitled "Stalin's Commander." John Erickson, a specialist on the history of World War II in the USSR, called Vlasov “one of Stalin’s favorite commanders.” Vlasov was trusted to give interviews to foreign correspondents, which indicates confidence in Vlasov from the country's top political leadership ^[7] .

In the 2nd Shock Army

On January 7, 1942, the Luban offensive operation began . The troops of the 2nd shock army of the Volkhov Front , created to thwart the German advance on Leningrad and subsequent counterattack, successfully broke through the enemy’s defenses in the area of Myasnoy Bor (on the left bank of the Volkhov river) and penetrated deeply into its location (in the direction of Lyuban ). But, lacking the strength for a further offensive, the army found itself in a difficult situation. The enemy cut her communications several times, creating a threat to the environment.

March 8, 1942, Lieutenant General Vlasov was appointed deputy commander of the Volkhov Front. On March 20, 1942, the commander of the Volkhov Front Kirill Meretskov sent his deputy A.A. Vlasov at the head of a special commission to the 2nd shock army (Lieutenant General Nikolai Klykov ). “For three days the commission members talked with commanders of all ranks, with political workers, with fighters” ^[18] , and on April 8, 1942, having drawn up an act of verification, the commission departed, but without General Vlasov. On April 16, General Klykov, a seriously ill patient ^[19] , was removed from the post of army commander and sent by plane to the rear.

On April 20, Vlasov was appointed commander of the 2nd Shock Army, while remaining part-time deputy commander of the Volkhov Front. During the operation to withdraw from the encirclement of the 2nd shock army during May-June, the 2nd shock army under the command of Vlasov made desperate attempts to break out of the bag. The actions of the troops of the 52nd and 59th armies of the Volkhov Front in order to break through to meet her were also unsuccessful.

We hit from the border Polist at 8 p.m. on June 4. We do not hear the actions of the troops of the 59th Army from the east, there is no long-range artillery fire.

- Vlasov. June 4, 1942. 00 hours 45 minutes ^[20] .

German captivity

The commander of the Volkhov operational group, Lieutenant General M. S. Khozin, did not comply with the Stavka directive (dated May 21) on the withdrawal of army troops. As a result, the 2nd shock army was surrounded, and Khozin himself was dismissed on June 6 with the wording:

For failure to comply with the order of the Headquarters on the timely and quick withdrawal of troops of the 2nd shock army, for paper-bureaucratic methods of command and control, for separation from the troops, as a result of which the enemy cut the communications of the 2nd shock army and the latter was put in an extremely difficult situation ^{[21 ]}

The measures taken by the command of the Volkhov Front managed to create a small corridor through which scattered groups of exhausted and demoralized soldiers and commanders came out.

TO THE MILITARY COUNCIL OF THE VOLHOVSK FRONT. I report: the army’s troops have been engaged in intense fierce battles with the enemy for three weeks ... The personnel of the troops have been exhausted, the number of deaths is increasing, and the incidence from exhaustion is increasing every day. Due to cross-shelling of the army area, the troops suffer heavy losses from artillery fire and enemy aircraft ... The combat strength of the formations decreased sharply. It is no longer possible to replenish it at the expense of the rear and special units. All that was taken. On June sixteenth, an average of several dozen people remained in battalions, brigades, and infantry regiments. All attempts by the eastern army group to break through the passage in the corridor from the west were unsuccessful.

- Vlasov. Zuev. Vinogradov. ^[22]

JUNE 21, 1942. 8 HOURS 10 MINUTES TO THE HEAD OF GSHA. MILITARY COUNCIL OF THE FRONT. Army troops receive fifty grams of rusks for three weeks. The last days of food were completely gone. We eat the last horses. People are extremely exhausted. There is a group mortality from hunger. There is no ammunition ...

- Vlasov. Zuev ^[22] .

On June 25, the enemy liquidated the corridor. Vlasov refused to abandon his own soldiers when the last plane flew after him to evacuate the commander deep into Soviet territory ^[23] . The testimonies of various witnesses do not provide an answer to the question of where lieutenant general A. A. Vlasov was hiding for the next three weeks - whether there was a roam in the forest or there was some kind of emergency command post to which his group was making their way. Thinking about his fate, Vlasov compared himself to General A.V. Samsonov , who also commanded the 2nd Army and also fell into German surroundings. Samsonov shot himself. According to Vlasov, he was distinguished from Samsonov by the fact that the latter had something for which he considered it worthy to give his life. Vlasov considered that he would not commit suicide in the name of Stalin ^[7] .

On July 11, in search of food, Vlasov and the only companion with whom he remained from the entire original group, the cook Voronova, went into the Old Believer village of Tukhovezh . The house they turned into turned out to be the home of the local headman. While Vlasov and Voronov were eating, the headman called the local auxiliary police, who surrounded the house and arrested the prisoners, while Vlasov persistently impersonated himself as a refugee teacher. The police locked them in a barn, and the next day, July 12, a German patrol arrived in Tukhovezh and identified Vlasov from a portrait in the newspaper. The village headman for the extradition of Vlasov received from the command of the 18th German Army a cow, 10 packs of shag, two bottles of caraway vodka and a certificate of honor ^[23] .

German Captivity and Cooperation with the Germans

While in the Vinnitsa military camp for captured high officers, Vlasov agreed to collaborate with the Nazis and headed the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (KONR) and the Russian Liberation Army (ROA), which consisted of captured Soviet military personnel .

Not a single photograph of this period of Vlasov’s life has been preserved, in which he would have been dressed in German military uniform (which distinguished Vlasov from his subordinates). He always wore a military uniform that was specially sewn for him (because of his huge physique) of military cut, a simple khaki uniform with wide cuffs and uniform trousers with general stripes . Buttons on the uniform were without military symbols, on the jacket were no insignia or awards, including the ROA emblem on the sleeve. Only on a general's cap he wore a white-blue-red cockade ROA ^[7] . There is evidence of the assignment of the rank of colonel general to him by the German command in 1943.

Vlasov wrote an open letter "Why I took the path of the struggle against Bolshevism" ^[24] . In addition, he signed leaflets calling for the overthrow of the Stalinist regime, which were subsequently scattered by the Nazi army from aircraft on the fronts, and also distributed among prisoners of war.

In early May 1945, a conflict arose between Vlasov and Bunyachenko - Bunyachenko had an intention to support the Prague uprising , and Vlasov persuaded him not to do this and to remain on the side of the Germans. At the talks in North Bohemian Kozoedy they did not agree, and their paths diverged.

Captivity by the Red Army, trial and execution

At the end of April 1945, the Spanish dictator Franco granted Vlasov political asylum and sent for him a special plane, which was ready to deliver Vlasov to Spain. Vlasov refused to abandon his soldiers. On May 12, 1945, the US commandant of the occupation zone in whose territory Vlasov was located, US Army Captain R. Donahue proposed secretly taking Vlasov deeper into the American occupation zone, providing him with food cards and documents. Vlasov ^[25] for the third time in his life refused to leave his subordinates. On the same day, heading deep into the American zone of occupation at the headquarters of the 3rd US Army in Pilsen in Czechoslovakia in order to seek political asylum for soldiers and officers of the KONR Armed Forces ^[23] , Vlasov was captured by members of the 25th Panzer Corps of the 13th Army 1 -th Ukrainian front not far from the city of Pilsen ^[26] , who pursued a small convoy of Vlasov at the direction of the captain of the Vlasov P. G. Kuchinsky, who informed them that it was in it was his commander. According to the Soviet version, Vlasov was found on the floor of a jeep wrapped in a carpet. This seems unlikely, given the interior space in the jeep and Vlasov's physique ^[7] . After the arrest, he was taken to the headquarters of Marshal I. S. Konev , and from there to Moscow ^[27] . From this moment until August 2, 1946, when the Izvestia newspaper published a report on his trial, nothing was reported about Vlasov ^[7]

At first, the leadership of the USSR planned to conduct a public trial of Vlasov and other leaders of the ROA in the October Hall of the House of Unions , however, fearing that the defendants could express anti-Soviet views “that could objectively coincide with the mood of a certain part of the population dissatisfied with the Soviet regime,” process leaders V. S. Abakumov and V.V. Ulrich addressed Stalin on April 26, 1946 with a request “to hear the case of the traitors <...> in a closed court session <...> without the participation of the parties”, which was done ^{[2 8]} .

From the criminal case of A. A. Vlasov ^[29] :

Ulrich: Defendant Vlasov, what specifically do you plead guilty of?

Vlasov: I plead guilty that, being in difficult conditions, pardoned ...

It seems that at the trial Vlasov tried to take full responsibility on himself, apparently believing that in this way he would be able to mitigate sentences for his subordinates ^[7] .

The decision on the death sentence in respect of Vlasov and others was adopted by the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU (B.) On July 23, 1946 ^[30] . From July 30 to July 31, 1946, a closed trial was held in the case of Vlasov and a group of his followers. All were found guilty of treason. By the verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR, they were stripped of their military ranks and hung on August 1, 1946, and their property was confiscated ^[7] . The bodies of the executed were cremated in the Don crematorium , the ashes were poured into one of the graves of the unclaimed ashes of the Don cemetery ^[23] , where during the years of Soviet power the ashes of “ enemies of the people ” executed in Moscow were dumped for decades ^[28] .

The transfer of the commander of the 2nd shock army A. A. Vlasov to the service of the Germans was one of the most unpleasant episodes of the war for Soviet historiography. There were other officers of the Red Army who took the path of struggle against the Soviet regime, but Vlasov was the most senior and most famous of all. In Soviet historiography, no attempt was made to analyze the motives of his act - his name either automatically blackened or, at best, was simply hushed up ^[14] .

Overseeing Vlasov in the ROA, SD officer Yu. L. Khmyrov (Dolgoruky), to hide his belonging to the criminal organization of the SD at the Vlasov trial, speaking as his personal adjutant, recalled that the Nazis always wanted to see not Mikhail Vlasov, but Dmitry Mikhailovich as head of the ROA Karbyshev , and the last time they offered him to head the ROA after being imprisoned in the Flossenburg camp. ^{[31] [32]}

A. V. Isaev noted that many of Vlasov’s colleagues in the Red Army, who wrote memoirs after the war, were put in an awkward position ^[14] :

You’ll write about the former commander well - they will say: “How did you not see this reptile?” You’ll write badly - they will say: “Why didn’t you hit the bells? Why didn't you report and tell where you should be? ”

For example, one of the officers of the 32nd Panzer Division of the 4th Mechanized Corps describes his meeting with Vlasov as follows: “Having leaned out of the cockpit, he noticed that the regiment commander was talking with a tall general in glasses. I recognized him right away. This is the commander of our 4th mechanized corps. I went up to them, introduced myself to the comcor. " The surname “Vlasov” is not mentioned at all throughout the narrative of the battles in Ukraine in June 1941 ^[33] .

M.E. Katukov preferred not to mention that his brigade was subordinate to the army commanded by Vlasov, and the former chief of staff of the 20th Army of the Western Front L.M.Sandalov in his memoirs circumvented the unpleasant question of meeting his commander with the help of the version about the disease Vlasova ^[34] . Later, this version was supported and developed by other researchers ^[35] , who claimed that from November 29 to December 21, 1941 Colonel Sandalov served as commander of the 20th Army of the Western Front, and it was under his actual leadership that the 20th Army liberated Krasnaya Polyana , Solnechnogorsk and Volokolamsk .

If Vlasov was mentioned in the memoirs of Soviet servicemen, then, most likely, in a negative way. For example, the cavalryman A. T. Stuchenko writes ^[36] :

Suddenly, three to four hundred meters from the front line, behind the bush, a figure of the army commander Vlasov grows up in a gray astrakhan fur hat with earflaps and unchanged pince-nez; rear adjutant with a gun. My annoyance spilled over the edge:

- What are you going here? There is nothing to watch here. Here people perish in vain. Is this how they organize the battle? Is that how cavalry is used?

Thought: now dismissed. But Vlasov, feeling unwell under fire, in an uncertain voice asked:

- Well, and how do you think it is necessary to advance?

Approximately in the same spirit, K. A. Meretskov spoke out, retelling the words of the chief of communications of the 2nd shock army, General A. V. Afanasyev : “It is characteristic that Vlasov took no part in the discussion of the planned actions of the group. He was completely indifferent to all changes in the movement of the group ” ^[37] . Isaev suggested ^[14] that this description may be “relatively accurate and objective,” since Afanasyev witnessed a breakdown of Vlasov’s personality, which led to betrayal: the commander of the 2nd shock was captured just a few days after “discussion of the planned actions” ( see Luban offensive operation ).

Marshal A.M. Vasilevsky , who became the chief of the General Staff of the Red Army in the spring of 1942, wrote in his memoirs about Vlasov also in a negative way:

“The commander of the 2nd shock army of Vlasov, not distinguished by great commanding abilities, besides by nature extremely unstable and cowardly, was completely inactive. The difficult situation created for the army further demoralized him; he made no attempt to quickly and covertly withdraw the troops. As a result, the troops of the 2nd shock army were surrounded ” ^[38] .

According to the Director of the Institute for Strategic Studies L.P. Reshetnikov :

For Soviet people, “Vlasovism” became a symbol of betrayal, and he himself became a Judas of that time. It came to the point that the namesake wrote in the questionnaire: “I am not a relative of the traitor general” ^[39] .

In this regard, search activities in the area of Myasniy Bor were difficult. Local authorities adhered to the version that “traitors-Vlasovites lie in Myasnoy Bor”. This saved them from the hassle of organizing a funeral, and the state from the cost of helping families of the victims. Only in the 1970s, thanks to the initiative of the search engine NI Orlov, the first three military cemeteries appeared at Myasniy Bor ^[40] .

Vlasov’s assessments among white emigrants and “second wave” emigrants who participated in the Liberation Movement of the Peoples of Russia (ODNR), as well as political figures of the Third Reich, are generally positive. So, at the 9th congress of the “Vlasov” organization, the Union for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (SBONR), an article was published “Tragedy of A. A. Vlasov and the Cases He Created,” by F. P. Bogatyrchuk , formerly a member of the Presidium of KONR, reflecting his attitude to the personality and activities of Vlasov. Bogatyrchuk said that for him, “the image of Vlasov was and is crystal clear. His death is an irreplaceable loss in the struggle against communism ” ^[41] .

Many of those who remained surrounded remained to the end, mostly fighters captured in the corridor and lightly wounded from large hospitals were captured. Many, under the threat of captivity, shot themselves, such as, for example, a member of the Military Council of the Army, division commissar I.V. Zuev. Others were able to go out to their own or make their way to the partisans , such as, for example, the commissar of the 23rd brigade, N. D. Allahverdiyev, who became the commander of the partisan detachment. Warriors of the 267th division, 3rd-level military doctor E. K. Gurinovich, nurse Zhuravlyova, commissar Vdovenko, and others ^[42] also fought in partisan units.

But there were few, most were captured. Basically, completely exhausted, exhausted people, often wounded, shell-shocked, in a semi-conscious state, such as the poet, senior political instructor M. M. Zalilov ( Musa Jalil ), were captured . Many did not even have time to shoot at the enemy, suddenly encountering the Germans. However, being captured, the Soviet soldiers did not cooperate with the Germans. Several officers who sided with the enemy are an exception to the general rule: in addition to General A. A. Vlasov, the oath of the 25th brigade was changed by Colonel P. G. Sheludko, officers of the headquarters of the 2nd Shock Army, Major Verstkin, Colonel Goryunov and Quartermaster 1 Zhukovsky rank ^[43] .

For example, the commander of the 327th Infantry Division, Major General I.M. Antyufeev , was wounded and was captured on July 5 . Antyufeev refused to help the enemy, and the Germans sent him to a camp in Kaunas , then he worked at the mine. After the war, Antyufeev was reinstated in the general rank, continued his service in the Soviet Army and resigned as Major General ^[44] . The head of the medical service of the 2nd Shock Army, 1st rank medical doctor Boborykin, was specially left surrounded to save the wounded army hospital. On May 28, 1942, the command awarded him the Order of the Red Banner. Being in captivity, wore the uniform of the commander of the Red Army and continued to provide medical assistance to prisoners of war. After returning from captivity, he worked at the Military Medical Museum in Leningrad ^[45] .

At the same time, numerous cases are known when prisoners of war continued to fight the enemy in captivity. The feat of Musa Jalil and his Moab notebooks is widely known when the battalions of the Idel-Ural legion, having killed the officers, with weapons in their hands went over to the partisans or the Red Army. There are other examples. Major N.I. Kononenko, the head of the sanitary service and brigade doctor of the 23rd Rifle Brigade, was captured on June 26, 1942, together with the staff of the brigade medical hospital. After eight months of hard work in Amberg, on April 7, 1943, he was transferred as a doctor to a camp hospital in the city of Ebelsbach ( Lower Bavaria ). There he became one of the organizers of the Revolutionary Committee, turning his hospital in the Mauthausen camp into the center of the patriotic underground. The Gestapo revealed the activities of the "Committee", and on July 13, 1944 Kononenko was arrested, and on September 25, 1944, he was shot along with the other 125th underground members. The commander of the 844th regiment of the 267th division, V. A. Pospelov, and the chief of staff of the regiment, B. G. Nazirov, were wounded, where they continued to fight the enemy and in April 1945 led a rebellion in the Buchenwald concentration camp ^[46] .

A case in point is the political instructor of the company of the 1004th regiment of the 305th division of D. G. Telnykh. Having been wounded (a leg wound) and shell-shocked in June 1942, he was sent to the camps, finally falling into the camp at the Schwarzberg mine. In June 1943, Telnykh escaped from the camp, after which the Belgian peasants in the village of Waterloo helped contact the partisan detachment No. 4 from Soviet prisoners of war (Lieutenant Colonel of the Red Army Kotovets). The detachment was part of the Russian partisan brigade "For Homeland" (Lt. Col. K. Shukshin). Telny participated in battles, soon became a platoon commander, and since February 1944 - a company political officer. In May 1945, the For Homeland brigade captured the city of Maizak and held it for eight hours until the British troops approached. After the war, Telnykh, along with other fellow partisans, returned to serve in the Red Army ^[47] .

Two months earlier, in April 1942, when the 33rd Army was withdrawn from encirclement, its commander M.G. Efremov and army staff officers committed suicide. And if M. G. Efremov, with his death, “whitewashed even those faint-hearted ones who trembled in difficult times and abandoned their commander to escape alone,” then they looked at the fighters of the 2nd shock through the prism of betrayal by A. A. Vlasov ^[48] .

In 2001, hieromonk Nikon (Belavenets) , the head of the movement “For Faith and Fatherland”, petitioned Vlasov and his associates to review the verdict ^[49] . However, the military prosecutor’s office concluded that there was no reason to apply the law on the rehabilitation of victims of political repression.

On November 1, 2001, the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation refused to rehabilitate A. Vlasov and others, canceling the sentence regarding conviction under part 2 of Art. 58 ^{10 of the} Criminal Code of the RSFSR (anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda) and terminating in this part the case for lack of corpus delicti. In the rest of the sentence upheld. ^[50]

There is a different interpretation of the question of the rehabilitation of A. A. Vlasov - in 1992 the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation , examining the case of the CPSU , adopted an official decision on the annulment of all repressive sentences that were passed by party bodies ^{[ specify ]} - in the case of Vlasov, the verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court was preceded by a decision of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b); that is, the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks made the death sentence, and then this death sentence was duplicated at a meeting of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court. The historian Kirill Alexandrov, on this basis, believes that the rehabilitation of Vlasov and his associates has already taken place ^{[51] [52]} .

Arguments of Vlasov Supporters

The version of patriotism of A. A. Vlasov and his movement has its supporters and is the subject of debate to date ^[53] .

Vlasov's supporters argue that Vlasov and those who joined the Russian liberation movement were driven by patriotic feelings and remained faithful to their homeland, but not to their government. One of the arguments in favor of this point of view was that “if the state provides protection to a citizen, he has the right to demand from himloyalty ”, but if the Soviet state refused to sign the Geneva Agreement and thereby deprived their captive citizens of their own protection, then citizens were no longer required to maintain loyalty to the state and, therefore, were not traitors ^[7] .

At the beginning of September 2009, the Synod of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia at its meetings touched upon disputes regarding the published book of the church historian, Archpriest Georgy Mitrofanov, “The Tragedy of Russia. "Forbidden" themes of the history of the 20th century in church sermon and journalism. " In particular, it was noted that:

The tragedy of those who are commonly called “Vlasovites” ... is truly great. In any case, it should be interpreted with all possible impartiality and objectivity. Beyond such an understanding, historical science is turning into political journalism. We ... should avoid the “black and white” interpretation of historical events. In particular, the naming of the acts of General A. A. Vlasov as betrayal, in our opinion, is a frivolous simplification of the events of that time. In this sense, we fully support the attempt of Father Georgy Mitrofanov to approach this issue (or rather, a whole series of questions) with a standard adequate to the complexity of the problem. In the Russian Diaspora, of which the surviving ROA members also became a part, General A. A. Vlasov was and remains a kind of symbol of resistance to godless Bolshevism in the name of the revival of Historical Russia. ... Everything that they undertook was done precisely for the Fatherland, in the hope that the defeat of Bolshevism would lead to the reconstruction of a powerful national Russia. Germany was considered by the "Vlasovists" exclusively as an ally in the fight against Bolshevism, but they, the "Vlasovists" were ready, if necessary, to confront the armed forces of any kind of colonization or dismemberment of our Motherland. We hope that in the future, Russian historians will treat the events of that time with more justice and impartiality than is happening today.

Arguments of opponents of Vlasov and his rehabilitation

Vlasov’s opponents believe that since Vlasov and those who joined him fought against the Soviet Union on the side of his enemy, they were traitors and collaborators. According to these researchers, Vlasov and fighters of the Russian liberation movement switched to the Wehrmacht not for political reasons, but to save their own lives, they were skillfully used by the Nazis for propaganda purposes, and Vlasov was nothing more than a tool in the hands of the Nazis ^[7] .

The Russian historian M. I. Frolov notes the great danger of attempts to heroize A. A. Vlasov, citing as their main consequences ^[54] :

• the desire to review the results of World War II, in particular, to devalue the agreements reached by the victorious countries at the Yalta and Potsdam conferences, at the Nuremberg trial of the main Nazi war criminals, to review the principles of international law recognized by the UN General Assembly (11/11/1946), recognized The statute of the tribunal and found expression in its verdict. Thus, various negative geopolitical, ideological and financial consequences for Russia can be achieved.
• justification of collaborationism in other countries (in particular, in the Baltic States and Ukraine), the desire to find a moral and psychological justification for the actions of anti-Russian political figures and forces, as well as the formation of a public consciousness that recognizes correct separatism.
• changing values ​​in society, the desire to remove the sources of positive self-awareness of the people, devaluing the victory in the Great Patriotic War by substituting the concepts of “treason - valor”, and “cowardice - heroism”.

According to the historian, “to represent the traitor Vlasov, collaborators“ in the role ”of fighters for Russia, for the Russian people is nothing but a moral unworthy attempt, a deliberate, deliberate distortion of the fundamental values ​​of Russian society - patriotism, love for the motherland, selfless service interests of its people ” ^[54] .

In 2009, with the support of the Russian Orthodox Church, the book “The Truth About General Vlasov: A Collection of Articles” was published, the main purpose of which, according to its authors, was “to show that the point of view of the professor of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, archpriest George Mitrofanov, on traitor general A "A. Vlasova, the Great Patriotic War is marginal for the Russian Orthodox Church." The authors emphasize that the betrayal of Vlasov and Vlasovites “is our pain and our shame, this is a shameful page in the history of the Russian people” ^{[55] [56]} .

• The first wife is Anna Mikhailovna Voronina.
• The second wife is Adelheid Bielenberg, Heidi, the widow of a German SS officer. She did not speak Russian, and Vlasov practically did not speak German. ^{[57] The} marriage was concluded in April 1945 and was personally sanctioned by Heinrich Himmler .
• The front wife (cohabitant) is the military doctor Agnes Pavlovna Podmazenko (1917-1997) ^{[58] [59]} , her son is Andrei Andreevich Podmazenko (born 1942).
• The cohabitant is a female hairdresser Yulia Semenovna Osadchaya (born 1915). Vlasov met her in 1934 in Leningrad , when he served as an assistant to the head of the combat training department of the Leningrad military district. In 1937, they had a daughter, Raisa, to whom Vlasov gave his last name ^[60] .

In separate memoirs, one can find the version that Vlasov was captured even earlier - in the fall of 1941, surrounded by Kiev - where he was recruited and thrown across the front line. He is credited with the order to destroy all the employees of his headquarters who did not want to surrender with him. So, the writer Ivan Stadnyuk claims that he heard this from General Saburov ^[61] . This version is not endorsed by published archival documents.

According to V. I. Filatov ^[62] and a number of other authors, ^[63] General A. A. Vlasov is a Soviet intelligence officer (an employee of the NKVD foreign intelligence or military intelligence - the Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Red Army), who since 1938 worked in China under the pseudonym "Volkov", conducting intelligence activities against Japan and Germany, and then during the Great Patriotic War was successfully abandoned to the Germans. The execution of Vlasov in 1946 is associated with the “welding” of special services - the MGB and the NKVD - as a result of which, according to the personal decision of Stalin and Abakumov, Vlasov was eliminated as a dangerous and unnecessary witness. Later, a significant part of the investigation materials on the “case” of Vlasov, Bunyachenko and other leaders of the KONR Armed Forces was destroyed.

The publication of Major General Pyotr Grigorenko “Only rats can be met underground” ^[64]

“In 1959, I met a friend of the officer whom I had seen before the war. We got into a conversation. The conversation concerned the Vlasovites. I said: - I had pretty close people there.
- Who? He asked.
- Trukhin Fedor Ivanovich - my group leader at the Academy of the General Staff.
- Trukhin ?! - even my interlocutor jumped up. - Well, so I took your teacher to the last road.
- Like this?
- That's how. You remember, it is obvious that when Vlasov was captured, the press reported this, and it was indicated that the leaders of the ROA would appear in open court. They were preparing for an open trial, but the behavior of the Vlasovites spoiled everything. They refused to plead guilty to treason. All of them - the main leaders of the movement - said they were fighting against the Stalinist terrorist regime. They wanted to free their people from this regime. And therefore they are not traitors, but Russian patriots. They were tortured, but did not achieve anything. Then they came up with “planting” for each of their friends in their previous lives. Each of us, planted, did not hide why he was planted. I was seated not to Trukhin. He had another, very close friend of his in the past. I “worked” with my former friend. All of us, “sat down,” were given relative freedom. Trukhin’s cell was not far from the one where I “worked”, so I often went there and talked quite a lot with Fedor Ivanovich. Before us was set only one task - to persuade Vlasov and his associates to admit their guilt of treason to the Motherland and not say anything against Stalin. For such behavior, it was promised to save their lives.

Some hesitated, but the majority, including Vlasov and Trukhin, were firmly in the same position: “I was not a traitor and I will not admit to treason. I hate Stalin. I consider him a tyrant and I will say this in court. ” Our promises of vital blessings did not help. Our frightening stories did not help either. We said that if they do not agree, then they will not be judged, but they will be tortured to death. Vlasov on these threats said: “I know. And I'm scared. But it’s even worse to slander yourself. And our torments will not be wasted in vain. The time will come, and the people will remember us with a kind word. " Trukhin repeated the same.

And the open trial did not work, ”my interlocutor concluded his story. - I heard that they were tortured for a long time and hanged half dead. As they hung me, I won’t even tell you about it ... ”

Roman Arkady Vasiliev "At one o’clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency"

Vlasov is one of the main characters in the novel ^[65] “At one o’clock in the afternoon, Your Excellency” Arkady Vasiliev . In this work, many episodes do not correspond to reality (for example, the scene of the arrest of Vlasov and the execution of his guard and mistress) for ideological reasons.

Confession novel by Vladimir Uspensky “Privy Advisor to the Leader”

In the novel by Vladimir Uspensky, “ Privy Advisor to the Leader, ” Vlasov’s successes were noted before he was captured. His activity in the military field was a great success, thanks to which he was in good standing with Stalin. It is noted that when Vlasov was presented for the award of the Order of the Red Star, Stalin, wishing to reward Vlasov for his services, decided to award him a higher award - the Order of Lenin, noting the following: “Zhukov certifies Vlasov in the best possible way. He raised the division, became an advanced. The corps commander praises him. Such people should be encouraged ... Why the Order of the Red Star? This is a good order, but comrade Vlasov deserves a higher award. " The author of the novel also reports that V. M. Molotov particularly admired Vlasov’s achievements, saying the following about him: “Napoleonic grip, hits and drives, drives and hits”. Under the leadership of Andreyev A.A., according to Stalin's plan, a scenario was being worked out for intentionally transferring the Soviet general to the enemy rear, capable of gaining the confidence of the Germans and creating armed formations from prisoners of war and at the right time to turn these formations against the Nazis. At a meeting with Stalin, where, in particular, Andreev, Shaposhnikov , the protagonist of the novel, and others, were also present, the candidatures of generals were considered, including A. Vlasov. In July 1942, it became known that Lieutenant General A. A. was missing. Vlasov, whose disappearance, Stalin, in accordance with the novel, "reacted much more calmly than happened in such cases."

Memoirs of Ilya Erenburg. People, years, life .

In the fifth book, I. Ehrenburg talks about his meeting with Vlasov during the battle for Moscow.

USSR Awards

• Order of Lenin (1941)
• 2 Orders of the Red Banner (1940, 01/02/1942)
• medal "XX years of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army"

Subsequently, by the verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR, he was deprived of all awards and titles.

Foreign Awards

• Insignia for the eastern peoples of the II degree with swords ( Germany ) ^[66]

Feature film

• “ Liberation ” (USSR, 1969) - actor Yuri Pomerantsev
• " Soldier 's Homeland " (USSR, 1975) - actor Yuri Pomerantsev
• “ The last battle of Major Pugachev ” (Russia, 2005) - actor Alexander Podobed
• “Second Shock. Vlasov’s devoted army. ” Fiction-journalistic film by A. Pivovarov , 2011 - in the role of Vlasov Rustem Adagamov .

Documentary

• “The defeat of German troops near Moscow” / Moscow Strikes Back. dir. L. Varlamov and I. Kopalin, 1942
• "Dossier on General Vlasov." dir. Danilov L., 1990.
• "Twofold damned general." dir. Ingo Betke, Pavel Sergeev, 1995.
• "A loop. One general and two Russian armies. ”, Producer Alexander Radov, 1997.
• “General Vlasov. A History of Betrayal. ” "Russia" , dir. Ivan Bobryshev, 2006.
• “General Vlasov. Betrayal, dir. Vladimir Tarasov, 2007
• “The dialogue at the gallows: New myths about General Vlasov.” Documentary film by Leonid Mlechin , 2008.
• “Pact with the Devil. General Vlasov and Ataman Krasnov. " Author and host Leonid Mlechin, dir. Alexander Sedelnikov, 2009.
• "Lobnya: episode of the 41st." ^[67] Authors of the Fourth Sergey and Maxim Ageev, dir. Igor Fomin, 2017.

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  Vlasov with his wife

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  General Vlasov

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  Awarding of General Vlasov in 1942

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  Vlasov among the heroes of the Moscow battle

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  Vlasov in captivity

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  Speech before a volunteer formation, Eastern Front, October 1944

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  Generals Vlasov and Zhilenkov at a meeting with Goebbels , February 1945

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  Vlasov and Himmler

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  Vlasov in Dabendorf (part of the photo)

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  Vlasov with the soldiers of the ROA

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  The trial of General Vlasov

• Russian collaborationism in the Second World War
• List of top Soviet officers captured during the Great Patriotic War

• General Andrey Vlasov (specialized site)
• Historical Encyclopedia. Vlasov A.A.
• Russian Volunteers in the German Wehrmacht in WWII (Lt. Gen. Władysław Anders and Antonio Muňoz {ed.} )
• General Vlasov. Man and mask . Article by L. M. Mlechin on the ITAR-TASS website
• "History of betrayal." Minutes of the first interrogation of Andrei Vlasov by the SMERSH investigator of May 25, 1945
• Vlasov Andrey Andreevich on the website of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation
• To the anniversary. “I tried to reveal the whole gang ...” (photo, caricature)