Destruction

[cyberia]

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGE
http://worldwartwozone.com/photopost...600x600Q85.jpg

[Geek44]

Nice work on the photos Paul...they're amazing.
Peace.

[cyberia]

[cyberia]

[cyberia]

[Jim O]

Looks perhaps like a snapshot meant to send home.

[Gotthard Heinrici]

Obviously taken pretty early in the offensive when the red Air force was caught napping. Great pics all the same!!

[cyberia]

Jim, I think a lot of these were just that and thus why they survived the war. When my father was captured he and every other man with him were searched and all photographs found in their possession, including those of family, were dropped in piles on the ground in front of them.

These were then gathered up and placed in a large bag and taken away.

I read a few years back that the NKVD had issued orders that political officers with all front line Soviet units were required to gather all photos found on the dead and captured to be sent back to Moscow.

According to the article, this was done in part to gather information, but the greater reason it stated was that the Soviet government was very concerned about photographs of large numbers of Russian POWs or large amounts of captured or destroyed Russian equipment circulating.

It stated that one chief concern of the communists was that photos of smiling Soviet citizens in German occupied areas was contrary to the official story that all resisted. It was also thought that some of these photos were used by the communists as evidence against individuals and entire villages as proof of collaboration.

[Gotthard Heinrici]

The plight of the civilians in the occupied territories is a terrible one. They suffered greatly under German Occupation and then again just as they thought they had been liberated. Very sad.

[cyberia]

The plight of the civilians in the occupied territories is a terrible one. They suffered greatly under German Occupation and then again just as they thought they had been liberated. Very sad.

Very true, and then persecuted again for possible collaboration. Those people could not catch a break.