Wehrmacht and Soviet Prisoners of War in Russia, 1941-1944

• Applicant: Dr. Sandra Dahlke, since 7/2024
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 440787703

The majority of the almost six million Soviet prisoners of war in German captivity did not reach the German “Reichsgebiet” but remained or died in the occupied territories. This part of Nazi mass crimes has not yet been systematically investigated. For the occupied Soviet territories, there are so far only surveys in the overall context of German warfare and military occupation, which concentrate on the years 1941/1942 and largely leave out the regions of Russia proper. Moreover, the second half of the war is generally far less well researched. The project aims to close this gap. It therefore concentrates on the Wehrmacht’s area of control in Russia based on archival holdings of German and Soviet provenance, most of which have recently been made accessible, and extends the chronological focus up to 1944. The multi-perspective approach adopted in the project explores the treatment of prisoners and the experience of captivity in tension with the sometimes contradictory political, ideological, and military objectives, the course of the war, and the basic understanding and goals of the actors of the Wehrmacht in Russia. By tracing the paths and experiences of individual prisoners of war and groups of prisoners of war in dense descriptions, it is possible to document a differentiated experience of captivity. Regional studies on the Army Groups North, Central and South ensure that, apart from the chronological extent, a differentiated analysis is given of the field of tension between German politics, the Wehrmacht, and the development of the war. Due to the war of Russia against Ukraine, the originally planned regional studies (Smolensk region, the triangle of Velikij Novogorod-Pskov-Leningrad, the Kursk-Voronež line as well as the areas of Krasnodar and Stalingrad/Rostov) had to be adapted to the new conditions in archives in order to maintain the conceptual grasp. The project thus offers a highly relevant contribution to illuminating the "Erinnerungsschatten" (‘shadow of memory’) in which the fate of Soviet prisoners of war has remained for more than 78 years after the end of World War II. The intensive scholarly study of the international legal dimensions of captivity, German war crimes, and the experience of millions of Soviet POWs – Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Georgians, Kazakhs, etc. – has gained an even greater political and societal topicality with the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the corresponding abuse of history by the Russian leadership for its own legitimization.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Ehemaliger Antragsteller: Privatdozent Dr. Andreas Hilger, until 7/2024 (†)