Barbarossa and the Partisans

German Counteractions

The Security Commands

The rear area commands had been specifically charged with maintaining the supply of the field armies and guaranteeing the exploitation of the land for the immediate use of the military. Thus the task of crushing the embryonic partisan bands in so far as they threatened the lines of communication and the supply points and depots or the rear in general fell to them.

Nine security divisions were available for this mission, each one comprising an infantry "alert" regiment of three battalions and a Landesschuetzen regiment of from three to four Landesschuetzen battalions and a guard battalion. Seven of the nine had an integral motorized police battalion. Army Group North Rear Area and Army Group Center Rear Area each had a security regiment of bicycle troops in general reserve while the former had an additional police regiment. Army Group South Rear Area also had several satellite security brigades for commitment in the deep rear and the Carpathian Mountains.

Basically the employment of the security divisions was the in the three army group sectors. Generally one division closely followed the main effort of the army group, keeping the major communication axis clear of interference, occupying the key population centers along the line of advance, and furnishing local protection for the operational headquarters.

The others fanned out on either side, occupying the larger towns and cities and covering the roads and railroads feeding the flank armies and the more important lateral links between units. The majority of this work fell to the Landesschuetzen units, patrolling the roads and rail lines and guarding important bridges, supply dumps, and the like, while the "alert regiments" either aided in clearing up the encircled pockets of Red Army personnel or were held as a mobile reserve for any serious insurgent outbreak. The police units concerned themselves with the general maintenance of order and handled traffic on the highways.

As the armies pushed farther and farther into the Russian interior and the rear grew larger and larger, and as the "alert" regiments were pulled out of the rear for front-line duty, two newly activated infantry divisions and several SS brigades were assigned to the security commands. To furnish special protection in critical areas or to curb especially troublesome resistance, security and police units were sometimes formed into group (Gruppe) commands.

To further supplement these security troops, especially in difficult and unmapped terrain, units of native volunteers were recruited. The first of these were Ukrainian security units formed by the Army Group South Rear Area when several partisan groups early in August began disrupting communications in the southern edge of the Pripyat Marshes. Because of their knowledge of the almost trackless terrain, these local Ukrainians gave considerable assistance in rooting out the sources of trouble. During the same period the rear area command in the northern sector organized a number of Estonian police units (Schutzmannschaft Abteilung) for security and anti-partisan work in Estonia. They were formed into battalions of 330 men each with one German officer and several German NCOs per unit.

On 25 July, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and the extreme westem portion of White Russia were detached from army jurisdiction and incorporated into the Reichskommissariat Ostland, and the Army Group North Rear Area and Army Group Center Rear Area were ordered to assign one security division each to the Reichskommissar. Similarly, on I September the Reichskommissar Ukraine assumed jurisdiction of that portion of the Ukraine west of the line Slucz River, with the Romanian, Hungarian, and Slovak security units there being transferred to the command of the Wehrmachtbefehlshaber. On 20 October the Reichskommissariat Ukraine was further extended eastward to the course of the middle and lower Dnepr.

As to the security divisions themselves, the first two months of operations indicated a number of organizational deficiencies within them which foreshadowed a decline in their effectiveness just at the time the partisans were growing in numbers and experience. Operations indicated they were not equipped for the mobile, hardhitting type of action required for success against an irregular foe. They were woefully short of motor vehicles, and those available to them were in a poor state of repair; they rarely had enough gasoline or other types of supplies; the personnel, being for the most part from the Landwehr classifications (35 to 45 years old), were proving poorly equipped physically for anti-partisan work.

From an operational standpoint the level of efficiency of the security divisions left a great deal to be desired. Due to the failure of OKH to prepare for an irregular rising, they were badly handicapped from the start by a 1ack of understanding of partisan resistance and training in methods of combating it. The operational directives issued them prior to the campaign had been drawn up without any clear conception of the type of warfare they were to fare and were too generalized for poorly staffed, relatively untrained units.

General missions and responsibilities had been outlined in these directives, but methodology was left completely to the discretion and initiative of the individual commanders. Initially, this lack of direction resulted at times in a 'wild state of anarchy' in anti-partisan operations and the unnecessary killing of numbers of innocent civilians. Coordination of effort was lacking and there was little or no interchange or pooling of information even among units of the same parent organization. Operations varied sharply according to the character of the commanders of the individual units and the qualities of the troops.

At best their tactical employment was desultory. Because of the expanse of country which had to be covered, they took positive measures against the partisans only when the supply lines and installations were openly threatened. Even then they stuck closely to the roads, and rail lines and the urban areas, and avoided the more difficult terrain and back- country regions. Seeing little of the growing opposition, unaware of or indifferent to the possibility of a developing pattern of hostility in the rear, and victorious in a few incidents over small insurgent groups, the security units gained in confidence and foresaw an early advent of complete peace and quiet there. They felt they were winning their war and that their areas of responsibility would be completely under control in a matter of weeks or days.

Laxity in the Rear

The lack of general security consciousness in all the German units heavily accentuated the shortcomings of the security units and made their work increasingly more difficult. The XXXIII Panzer Corps admitted that its troops were "too softhearted and trusting" toward the indigenous population and that as far as 13-14 miles behind the front lines suspicious individuals continually roamed the highways without check. Officers often demonstrated extreme carelessness regarding the protection of troop installations.

Passes and identification papers were continually counterfeited and successfully used. A number of captured partisans obtained safe conduct passes from local administrative commanders merely by stating that they were liberated Soviet political prisoners. The political commissar of the 1st Partisan Regiment reported to Moscow: "Several of our partisans, when captured by the Germans, identified themselves as escapees from the Russian regime or prisons. After obtaining identification papers from the German headquarters in Yemilchino in this manner, they reconnoitered the area and returned to the Russian lines."

Legal identification papers were issued civilians without termination dates which made it easy for irregulars to use them in carrying on their activities for long periods of time without hindrance; partisan reconnaissance missions become more uniformly successful and messenger service unproved when it was discovered that Nazi troops would not stop or harm elderly, well-dressed people. Even after considerable casualties, single vehicles continued on the road and German soldiers still roamed the countryside alone or in groups of only two or three, a condition not ordered corrected until late in September. Even then, convoys continued to travel at night when they were more vulnerable to partisan action.

Considerable trust was placed in village elders and mayors who were often informed of impending anti-partisan operations and as often passed the information along to irregular groups. The elders were entrusted with the task of collecting all firearms from the people under their jurisdiction and only after some time was it discovered that while the weapons were being collected in many cases they were being handed over to the partisans rather than to the German authorities.

Security units were too often committed on the basis of old or unchecked information and mere rumors which led to fruitless dispersion of strength. It was found that the natives often reported the presence of partisans in order to obtain arms. Too often the security troops when occupying a town failed to take a census of the civilian population which made it possible for nonresidents to move freely and enabled Red Army personnel to commit sabotage in civilian clothes. In one instance the failure to check civilians enabled a Russian officer in mufti to penetrate near a high German command post and gain valuable information. The Soviets found that the security units occupied only villages and towns located along the main highways, leaving untouched the more remote villages, and ordered these used as partisan strongpoints.

It was only after captured Soviet documents indicated that the Russians had perceived and were exploiting this laxity that measures were taken at high level to correct these deficiencies. Late in September OKH issued a directive calling for stringent measures to be taken by all officers to improve security discipline.

Passive Measures by the Army

In addition to the uncoordinated and none too aggressive active measures taken by the Germans in the first few weeks of the campaign, a number of more passive attempts were made to check the growth of the partisan movement. In the latter part of July rewards as high as 3,000 rubles ($1,500) were offered to the native population for information leading to the arrest of Soviet insurgents. Apparently the offers brought only meager results, for within two weeks the proffered bribes were changed to threats.

On 9 August it was proclaimed in one sector that any person belonging to a partisan formation, any person furnishing aid or comfort, directly or indirectly, to such partisans, or any person withholding information of partisans would be shot. As an afterthought was added the note that anyone furnishing useful intelligence on irregulars would be rewarded with cash and rations. All weapons were ordered turned in and local Russian officials were made responsible for the compliance of the people.

After a given deadline, all persons found in possession of firearms were to be shot as partisans. If a conspiracy was proven, entire villages were to be burned down. In the Ukraine all radios, both receivers and transmitters, were confiscated, despite the absence of partisan opposition there and without regard for the loss of a valuable propaganda medium. Late in August a further step was taken: in the northern sector the native male population of several critical areas was evacuated and placed in detention camps in an effort to curb unrest.

Prisoner of War Status of the Partisans

OKH Directives

Even OKH, weighed down as it was with directing the campaign, found itself pulled into the partisan picture by the problem of control of the huge number of prisoners taken in the successive encirclements. Due to the. speed of the advance and the shortage of manpower, thousands of surrendered Red Army soldiers roamed unrestricted through the rear areas in search of food, pillaging and marauding, and often allied themselves with the partisans. The problem grew to such an extent that the rear area commands found it increasingly difficult to control the one and combat the other.

In an attempt to clarify the situation and establish a basis for separating the legal from the illegal, OKH on the advice of the Chief of the Army Legal System (Der Chef des Heeres Justizwesens), issued a series of directives defining the prisoner of war status of combatants and noncombatants under varying situations of belligerency.

On 3 July it directed that: "Soldiers in uniform, with or without arms, are considered lawful belligerents. Those in civilian clothes, with or without arms, according to age and looks considered draftable, are to be accorded rights as prisoners of war. Civilians in mufti or half uniform found with arms are to be considered guerrillas."

On 18 July this was supplemented to the extent that members of partisan units, in front of or behind the German lines, when not wearing a uniform or insignia recognizable by the opposing forces, were to be considered as guerrillas and treated as such. Inhabitants of cities and villages who aided such persons were: to be treated: according to the same rules. And further, on 25 July, individual soldiers roaming the rear areas in uniform or civilian clothes were to be advised by means of public address systems, radio, or posters that they should give themselves up to the nearest German organization. Should they fail to do this by a certain date, to be determined by the rear area commander, they were to be considered as guerrillas and treated as such. These directives were all legally well within the provisions of the Geneva Convention of 1929 relative to the treatment of prisoners of war (PWs) and stood in sharp contrast to Rosenberg's flat declaration that the Hague Rules of Land Warfare were not applicable to BARBAROSSA since the Reich considered the USSR dissolved as a sovereign power.

Following the leads at OKH, Army Group Center Rear Area ordered its units to issue a proclamation stating that all Russian soldiers found west of the Berezina River after 15 August would be considered as guerrillas (Freischaerler) and treated as such. When large numbers of stragglers surrendered as a result of this policy, the time limit was extended to 31 August. The Ninth Army issued declarations to the effect that former Red Army personnel who had been forced to join partisan groups would be accorded PW status if they surrendered prior to 5 September.

Even parachutists, who in the first weeks of the war were all considered saboteurs and treated as such, were ordered accorded rights as PWs when captured in uniform. Civilians found with weapons or captured in or after skirmishes were still to be considered partisans and shot or hanged.

The same general attitude existed in the southern sector where notices were posted stating that all Red Army stragglers were to give themselves up by 18 August or be treated as partisans.

In September the armies received from Hitler what apparently was intended as the last word relative to the prisoner of war status of combatants in the rear areas. Russian combat troops under the command of an officer who got behind the German lines on a defiMite mission were when captured to be treated as prisoners of war so long as they were not a part of units which had previously surrendered. Any soldiers who came out of hiding after actual combat was over and renewed the fight in the rear were to be treated as guerrillas. All soldiers who were involved in actions with a "people's war" tinge-sabotage, attacks on single vehicles, and the likewere to be considered guerrillas. Troop commanders were to draw the distinction on their own initiative.

The OKW Approach

The reaction of OKW to these beginnings of resistance was but an elaboration of the policies regarding the treatment to be accorded the Russian people laid down in the political and economic planning. The whole of the occupied territories had to be pacified as quickly as possible. The resistance there had to be crushed. The best method was a strict reign of terror.

When the security commands encountered increasing difficulty in keeping the lines of communication clear and began to request more units for security duties, the OKW reply was typical:

    The troops availab1e for securing the conquered eastern areas will, considering the vast expanse of these stretches, suffice only if the occupying power meets all resistance, not by legally punishing the guilty, but rather by spreading that type of terror which is the only means of taking from the population every desire for opposition.

    The respective commanders are to be held responsible, together with the troops at their disposal, for quiet in their areas. The commanders must find the means to keep their districts in order by employing suitable draconian measures, not by requesting more security forces.

The approach to pacification was to be heavy-handed. There was to be no other. Resistance was to be crushed in a ruthless manner, not turned into more harmless channels.

As the weeks passed the evidences of revolt did not lesson, and in mid- September OKW took an even more repressive approach:

    The measures taken up to now to deal with this general insurrection movement have proved inadequate. The Fuehrer has now given orders that we take action everywhere with the most drastic means in order to crush the movement in the shortest possible time.

    Action taken in this matter should be in accordance with the following general directions:

      a. It should be inferred, in every case of resistance to the German occupying forces, no matter what the individual circumstances, that it is of Communist origin.

      b.In order to nip these machinations in the bud, the most drastic measures should be taken immediately on the first indication, so that the authority of the occupying forces may be maintained, and further spreading prevented. In this connection it should be remembered that a human life in unsettled countries frequently counts for nothing and a deterrent effect can be attained only by unusual severity. The death penalty for 50-100 Communists should generally be regarded in these cases as suitable atonement for one German soldier's life. The way in which sentence is carried out should still further increase the deterrent effect. The reverse course of action, that of imposing relatively lenient penalties, and of being content, for purposes of deterrence, with the threat of more severe measures, does not accord with these principles and should therefore not be followed.

There is little evidence that these directives were carried out by the line armies. The indications are that, with but few exceptions, they were ignored and the OKH policy was generally followed in the zone of operations.

There was no attempt to soften the effect of such tactics by a change in the psychological approach. Propaganda remained negative, and even verged on the hypocritical. It was designed primarily to keep the population from joining or supporting the partisans. They were to be promised nothing. Beyond threats, warnings, and prohibitions, the emphasis was to remain on the role of the Germans as liberators come to create "a new system of social justice.:

The people in the individual Soviet republics were to be given no expectation of the restoration of their national sovereignty and no encouragement toward the development of a national consciousness. There were to be told merely that their political future would be worked out after the war. The peasantry was to be cautiously told that for the time being the collective farms were not to be broken up, that such would lead to too much economic dislocation. The one concession granted was in the matter of religion. The religious question was to be viewed as the business of the individual, to be tolerated but not encouraged.

Barbarossa and the Partisans

Back to Table of Contents -- Combat Simulation Vol 2 No. 1
Back to Combat Simulation List of Issues
Back to MagWeb Magazine List
© Copyright 1995 by Mike Vogell and Phoenix Military Simulations.
This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com