The Exception (17 page)

The rapes no one wants to remember

Afterwards all those involved tried to suppress awareness of these violations. The subject was taboo until a German book about it was finally published in 1992,
Befreier und Befreite (Liberators Take Liberties)
, a collection of papers edited by Helke Sander and Barbara Johr. In his contribution, the statistician Gerhard Reichling estimates that 1.9 million German women were raped during the months of the invasion. The number of actual rapes is many times greater, since it was rare for a woman to be raped only once. A major proportion of the forty thousand written witness accounts held in the German Bundesarchiv – Ostdokumentation (a state archive for documentation about the eastern front, housed in the city of Bayreuth) describes how groups of women were kept captive in cellars to be used by soldiers in any way the men wanted, at any time.

There are several eyewitness accounts describing what took place in the East Prussian country town of Nemmersdorf, where naked women were crucified on the doors, nails hammered through their hands and feet. Children, wounded soldiers from the German army, and old men who had never been called up were shot in the back of the head or transported to Russian concentration camps or clubbed to death.

Ilya Ehrenburg, the Stalinist writer, wrote in a leaflet distributed to the Russian soldiers: ‘Count not days, nor the kilometres travelled. Count only the number of Germans you have killed. Kill Germans – this is your mother’s prayer. Kill Germans – this is the cry from the land of Russia. Do not hesitate. Do not stop. Kill.’

The soldiery was not only Russian, but included Mongolian cavalry and contingents from the other 150, mainly Asiatic, nationalities under Soviet rule. All were let loose to do anything
and everything they wanted, except show mercy. Gang rapes were rewarded as if they were heroic acts. Not participating in the killing of German civilians could lead to court martial and was punished either by imprisonment (as in the case of Solzhenitsyn) or execution.

The winter of 1945 was harsh. The exodus of Germans from East Prussia took place at temperatures of 18 to 25 degrees below zero. The Soviet air force, and later its tank divisions, shot at and bombed the refugees. In a flanking manoeuvre the infantry cut off escape routes to West Germany and many of the refugees chose to walk towards the coast instead, where they tried to board ships. One of these ships, the
Wilhelm Gustloff
, designed to carry 1,460 passengers, was sunk by a Soviet submarine. Of the 11,000 civilians on board, 9,000 died in that one attack – roughly six times as many as drowned in the sinking of the
Titanic
.

Königsberg becomes Kaliningrad

Many fugitives were stranded in Königsberg, the besieged East Prussian capital. The harbour city of Königsberg was once one of Germany’s finest, cultured and elegant, and full of beautiful old buildings, including a famous cathedral, museums and theatres. Before Hitler’s rise to power, the university in Königsberg was internationally acclaimed. The city boasted seven newspapers and Germany’s biggest bookshop, which catered for – among others – its many scientists and artists. In July 1944 a group of Königsberg officers carried out a failed attempt to kill Hitler.

Over the seven hundred years of its existence, Königsberg’s population had grown to 380,000, but when it surrendered only around a hundred thousand remained. Many had fled to the city from the countryside to the east of it; others were families on the run from the bombing raids on Berlin.

The American diplomat and historian George Frost Kennan flew over the deserted East Prussian land. He wrote in his memoirs: ‘The Russian invasion is a catastrophe for this region
that has no counterpart in contemporary Europe. In many areas the original population has been decimated so that hardly a man, woman or child remains alive; it is impossible to believe that they all managed to escape to the West.’

After the defeat of Germany this part of the old Prussian territory came under Soviet rule. This meant that three-quarters of the remaining population of Königsberg died from sickness and starvation. The 25,000 survivors were deported in 1947 to what was to become the newly designated DDR. Some ended up in Nazi-built concentration camps, which were now used by both the Polish and the Soviets. Here, about 75 per cent of the prisoners died, mainly from starvation, typhus and torture.

Expulsions in the post-war years

The forced displacement of civilians from the old German provinces of East Prussia, Silesia and Pomerania continued during the post-war years. Stalin, at his meetings with Churchill and Roosevelt, insisted on holding on to the parts of Poland that the Soviet Union had annexed after Stalin’s pact with Hitler in 1939. Poland therefore had to be compensated. At the Tehran conference in December 1943, Churchill used three matches to demonstrate how this could be done: he put down two matches first, removed the right one and added a new match to the left of the remaining one.

In the real world, this shift in Polish territory led to the removal of 3 million Germans from their old homeland, which now belonged to Poland, and the relocation of the displaced people. They were left to fend for themselves and make a living as best they could. The emptied rural areas and towns were then to be repopulated by the 3 million Poles deported from the new Soviet territory.

With callous brutality, Germans were also driven out of German-speaking regions in Czechoslovakia, Hungary,
Yugoslavia and other European countries. They lost their homes and all property that they could not carry.

Europe’s largest ethnic-cleansing operation

More than 15 million Germans were expelled from their native regions. Also, over 2 million German civilians either were murdered or died from starvation, cold or the terrible ordeals they endured during 1945 and the first five years after peace was declared. Sheer numbers make this one of Europe’s largest genocides and it wiped out East German culture.

No one doubts the correctness of the figures, which are based on documentation in German archives. Despite this, international research has paid relatively little attention to this mass extermination.

In the
Encyclopedia of Genocide
, the deportation of Germans is referred to in a table listing the greatest genocides of the twentieth century, but there is no separate article describing it. This work of reference does, however, include long articles about other, numerically smaller genocides.

Similar weaknesses are found in other standard works, such as
Century of Genocide
and
The History and Sociology of Genocide
. Nobody contradicts the fact that the post-war forced displacement of Germans was one of the largest Europe has ever seen, but it is also true that nobody has chosen to write about it at any length. It is not difficult to understand why this should be.

‘The Germans started it.’

No serious researcher would like to be associated with changing the emphasis placed on the German slaughter of Jews, Slavs, gypsies and homosexuals. It was indeed the Germans who systematised genocide and constructed machinery that made killing people more efficient than ever before.

It follows that the question of guilt is critical. Can German children be held responsible for unimaginable crimes against
humanity committed by their older male relatives? The Nazis themselves would have argued that this is the case: according to their principles, whole populations are rightly punished for the crimes of individuals.

But do we still think this way today?

An information gap

Even though academic interest in the ethnic cleansing of Germans has increased a great deal during recent years – both inside and outside Germany – it can still be difficult to find precise and objective information. For instance, if one tries to look up the greatest shipping disaster in the world – the sinking of the
Wilhelm Gustloff –
there is no entry in the
Danish National Encyclopedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica
or the large German encyclopaedia
Brockhaus
.

Web searches on the German words ‘
Vertreibung
’ (‘expulsion’) and ‘
deutsche
’ (‘German’) and on ‘1945’ produce many thousands of links, mostly to the large societies supporting German displaced persons. The objectivity of such societies is obviously questionable. A search on the corresponding English words results in a much more compact collection of links.

However, many of these sites display distorted narratives of the history of the Second World War and especially of the Holocaust. Although they claim to provide neutral, academically valid research results, much is in fact written by those who deny the reality of the Holocaust. In many cases, Holocaust denial is a symptom of alignment with neo-Nazi organisations.

DCGI arranges a conference about the German expulsion

In other words, it is still difficult to find reliable information about this particular genocide and especially for those not professionally concerned with genocide research. Highly tendentious books and websites are mixed in with more valid sources.

This is why DCGI will be holding a public conference about the expulsion. The conference will take place on the 15–17 May. The Centre hopes it will help support new research and detach the knowledge of this tragedy from the home pages created by those who aim to falsify history.

Set these dates aside now. Further information about the programme and registration will be available in a later issue of
Genocide News.

Frederik Thorsteinsson, the head of the Centre for Democracy, which promotes the use of democratic practices in East European countries, is also the deputy chairman of the DCGI board. Frederik is the only man on the board who is younger than Paul, which might have something to do with Paul’s dislike of him.

Frederik’s main academic subject was history. His doctoral thesis, ‘The Origins of the Democratic Tradition in Denmark’, was completed at an unusually early age and was awarded Copenhagen University’s Gold Medal. After a stint at the Modern History Research Unit at Roskilde University, he landed the post at the Centre for Democracy and then the place on the DCGI board.

It was not long before Frederik and Paul had their first skirmish. They disagreed about how to handle an information project in Republika Srpska, the Bosnian Serb republic. During the week of the worst infighting, the DCGI staff held their Christmas party in a chic lakeside restaurant. Late that evening, Paul, Malene and Iben ended up in a club in Nørrebro, full of stragglers from umpteen other Christmas dinners.

In the middle of the noise and music Paul suddenly confided in Malene: ‘Malene, don’t you see that Frederik is only in it for himself? That’s why he’s always so fucking astute and politically correct. All he thinks about is his own career. I mean, can you point to one single ethical value he’d stick to if it wasn’t in his own interest?’

The following Monday Paul asked Malene to have a word with him in his office. He tried to backtrack on what he had said, but didn’t make too good a job of it.

‘Malene, I’m not happy about what I said to you on Friday
night. You know what I mean – about Frederik. I have no real reason to suspect him of bad faith and it was very poor form to pass my doubts on to you. I really regret it. So, could we let it stay between us?’

She said, ‘Yes, of course.’

‘I’m probably prejudiced,’ Paul went on. ‘To me, he looks just like an SS officer in one of those American war films from the sixties. That is, apart from his hairstyle.’

Malene laughed. Actually, Paul’s description seemed rather apt: Frederik was easily six inches taller than all the other men on the board and was apparently very pleased with his blond hair, high cheekbones and small, straight nose.

Women tend to like Frederik, who can be charming in spite of his upper-class mannerisms. Indeed Malene suspects he could have any one of the four women working in the Centre, but no one mentions this when Paul is within earshot. Malene herself has a great relationship with Frederik, with just the right amount of flirtation.

Three weeks after the Christmas party, Paul was offered a seat on the board of the Centre for Democracy, and he accepted at once. In one way, even though he isn’t the deputy chairman, he is now senior to Frederik.

On the Wednesday afternoon Frederik phones Malene. He is researching a book and needs to see proceedings from old Polish court cases.

Of course Malene can arrange for him to have access to the documents, but by now Paul’s new rule is in force. She should refer Frederik and his library request to Anne-Lise. She looks quickly across the desk at Iben. Iben has obviously figured out who is on the other end of the line. They raise their eyebrows simultaneously.

Malene pauses briefly and then says, pleasantly, that she will arrange to have the document boxes put in the Large Meeting Room.

Afterwards Malene confesses to Iben. ‘Look, I simply couldn’t
do it. Not today.’ She tries to smile. ‘Not when it was Frederik who asked me.’

Iben says nothing, just reaches out for her mug of coffee.

Malene catches on to what was left unsaid. ‘I know, I know.’

She locates the registration code. It’s easy, because Anne-Lise has entered the codes in the library catalogue. She chats with Iben for a few moments to steady herself before fetching the boxes. As she passes Anne-Lise’s desk, she makes an effort to say hello.

The Polish documents are buried at the back of the library, on shelving left from the days when the City Council kept its archives there. On the way out, pushing a small trolley with five boxes, Malene feels she must say something.

‘How’s it going?’

‘Fine.’ Anne-Lise asks no questions.

Malene pushes the trolley along to the Large Meeting Room. The board meets there every other month, but it too has gradually filled up with bookshelves and, despite its name, the room is mainly used by visitors who want to read in peace.

Frederik stops by Iben’s and Malene’s desks for a chat before going off with Malene to start on the boxes.