Second World War was the most destructive war in the history of mankind. Its consequences are still debated to this day. 80% of the world's population took part in it.

Many questions arise about how many people died in World War II, as different sources of information give different figures for the loss of life between 1939 and 1945. The differences are due to where the original information was obtained, as well as to which method of calculation was used.

Total death toll

It is worth noting that many historians and professors have been studying this issue. The number of deaths from Soviet Union was calculated by the staff of the General Staff of the Armed Forces Russian Federation. According to new archival data, the information of which is given for 2001, the Great Patriotic War claimed the lives of 27 million people in total. Of these, more than seven million people are military personnel who were killed or died from their injuries.

Talk about how many people died from 1939 to 1945. as a result of hostilities, continue to this day, since it is almost impossible to calculate the losses. Various researchers and historians give their data: from 40 to 60 million people. After the war, the real data was hidden. During the reign of Stalin, it was said that the losses of the USSR amounted to 8 million people. During the Brezhnev era, this figure increased to 20 million, and during the period of perestroika - up to 36 million.

The free encyclopedia Wikipedia provides the following data: more than 25.5 million military personnel and about 47 million civilians (including all participating countries), i.e. in total, the number of losses exceeds 70 million people.

Read about other events in our history in the section.

At the same time, as the study of the balance of power on the world stage and the review of the role of all those who participated in the coalition against Hitler proceeds, the quite reasonable question more and more often arises: "How many people died in World War II?" Now everything modern facilities media and some historical documents continue to support the old ones, but at the same time create new myths around this topic.

One of the most hardened says that the Soviet Union won only thanks to colossal losses that exceeded the loss in enemy manpower. The latest, most modern myths that are being imposed on the whole world by the West include the opinion that without the help of the United States, victory would have been impossible, allegedly all this is only because of their skill in waging war. However, thanks to statistics, it is possible to conduct an analysis and still find out how many people died in World War II and who made the main contribution to the victory.

How many fought for the USSR?

Undoubtedly, he suffered huge losses, brave soldiers sometimes went to their deaths with understanding. Everyone knows this. In order to find out how many people died in World War II in the USSR, it is necessary to turn to dry statistical figures. According to the 1939 census, approximately 190 million people lived in the USSR. The annual increase was about 2%, which amounted to 3 million. So, it is easy to calculate that by 1941 the population was 196 million people.

We continue to argue and back up everything with facts and figures. So, any industrially developed country, even with full total mobilization, could not afford such a luxury as to call for more than 10% of the population to fight. Thus, the approximate number of Soviet troops should have been 19.5 million. Based on the fact that at first men born in the period from 1896 to 1923 and further to 1928 were called up, it is worth adding another one and a half million each year, from which it follows that the total number of all the military for the entire period of the war was 27 million people.

How many of them died?

In order to find out how many people died in World War II, it is necessary to subtract about 2 million from the total number of soldiers on the territory of the Soviet Union for the reason that they fought against the USSR (in the form of various groups, such as the OUN and the ROA).

25 million remain, of which 10 were still in service at the end of the war. Thus, approximately 15 million soldiers left the army, but it should be borne in mind that not all of them were dead. For example, about 2.5 million were released from captivity, and some more were simply commissioned due to injury. Thus, the official figures are constantly fluctuating, but it is still possible to derive an average value: 8 or 9 million people died, and these are precisely the military.

What really happened?

The problem is that not only the military were killed. Now consider the question of how many people died in World War II precisely among the civilian population. The fact is that the official data indicate the following: out of 27 million people of total losses (offers us official version), it is necessary to subtract 9 million military, which we calculated earlier using simple arithmetic calculations. Thus, it turns out the figure of 18 million is the civilian population. Now let's look at it in more detail.

In order to calculate how many people died in World War II in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Poland, it is necessary to turn again to dry, but irrefutable statistics, which indicate the following. The Germans occupied the territory of the USSR, in which, after the evacuation, about 65 million people lived, which was one third.

Poland lost about one-fifth of the population in this war, despite the fact that the front line passed through its territory many times, etc. During the war, Warsaw was practically destroyed to the ground, which makes up about 20% of the dead population.

Belarus has lost about a quarter of the population, and this despite the fact that fierce battles and partisan activities took place on the territory of the republic.

On the territory of Ukraine, the losses amounted to approximately one-sixth of the entire population, and this despite the fact that a huge number of punishers, partisans, resistance units and various fascist "rabble" roaming the forests acted.

Losses among the population in the occupied territory

What percentage of casualties among the civilian population should be characteristic of the entire occupied part of the territory of the USSR? Most likely, no higher than about two-thirds of the total population of the occupied part of the Soviet Union).

Then you can take the number 11 as a basis, which turned out when two-thirds were taken away from the total 65 million. Thus, we get the classic 20 million total losses. But even this figure is gross and inaccurate to the maximum. Therefore, it is clear that in the official report on how many people died in World War II among the military and civilians, the figures are exaggerated.

How many people died in World War II in the USA

The United States of America also suffered losses in both equipment and manpower. Of course, they were insignificant compared to the USSR, so after the end of the war they could be calculated quite accurately. Thus, the figure turned out to be 407.3 thousand dead. As for the civilian population, there were almost none among the dead citizens of America, since no hostilities were conducted on the territory of this country. Losses total 5 thousand people, mostly passengers of passing ships and sailors of the merchant fleet, who were hit by German submarines.

How many people died in World War II in Germany

As for the official figures regarding German losses, they look at least strange, since the number of missing people is almost the same as the dead, but in fact everyone understands that they are unlikely to be found and return home. If we add together all the missing and killed, we get 4.5 million. Among civilians - 2.5 million. Isn't it strange? After all, then the number of losses of the USSR turns out to be doubled. Against this background, there are some myths, conjectures and misconceptions about how many people died in World War II in Russia.

Myths about German losses

The most important myth that stubbornly spread throughout the Soviet Union after the end of the war is the comparison of German and Soviet losses. Thus, the figure of German losses was also taken into circulation, which remained at the level of 13.5 million.

In fact, the German historian general Bupkhart Müller-Hillebrand voiced the following figures, which were based on a centralized account of German losses. During the war years, they amounted to 3.2 million people, 0.8 million died in captivity. In the East, about 0.5 million did not survive captivity, and another 3 died in battle, in the West - 300 thousand.

Of course, Germany, together with the USSR, waged the most cruel war of all times and peoples, which did not mean a drop of pity and compassion. Most of the civilians and prisoners on both sides were dying of starvation. This was due to the fact that neither the Germans nor the Russians could provide food for their prisoners, as the famine would then starve their own peoples even more.

Outcome of the war

Historians still cannot calculate exactly how many people died in World War II. In the world, different figures are being voiced every now and then: it all started with 50 million people, then 70, and now even more. But the same losses that, for example, Asia suffered from the consequences of the war and outbreaks of epidemics against this background, which claimed a huge number of lives, will probably never be possible to calculate. Therefore, even the above data, which were collected from various authoritative sources, is far from conclusive. And it will most likely never be possible to get an exact answer to this question.

What were the population losses of the USSR during World War II? Stalin stated that they were equal to 7 million, Khrushchev - 20. However, is there any reason to believe that they were significantly larger?
By the beginning of the war, the population of the USSR was 197,500,000 people. The "natural" population growth from 1941 - 1945 was 13,000,000 people, and the "natural" decline was 15,000,000 people, since the war was going on.
By 1946, the population of the USSR should have been 195,500,000 people. However, at that time it was only 168,500,000 people. Consequently, the loss of population during the war was 27,000,000 people. An interesting fact: the population of the republics and territories annexed in 1939 is 22,000,000 people. However, in 1946 it was 13 million. The fact is that 9 million people emigrated. 2 million Germans (or those who called themselves Germans) moved to Germany, 2 million Poles (or those who knew a few words from the Polish dialect) moved to Poland, 5 million inhabitants of the western regions of the USSR moved to the countries of the West.
So, direct losses from the war: 27 million - 9 million = 18 million people. 8 million people out of 18 million - these are civilians: 1 million Poles who died at the hands of Bandera, 1 million who died during the blockade of Leningrad, 2 million civilians, classified by the Nazis as persons capable of taking up arms (age from 15 to 65 years) and kept in concentration camps along with Soviet prisoners of war, 4 million Soviet citizens, classified by the Nazis as communists, partisans, etc. Every tenth Soviet person died.

Losses of the Red Army - 10 million people.

What were the German population losses during World War II?By the beginning of the war, the population of Germany proper was 74,000,000 people. The population of the Third Reich is 93 million people.By the autumn of 1945, the population of Germany (Vaterland, not the entire Third Reich) was 52,000,000 people. More than 5 million Germans immigrated from the Volksdeutsche to the country. So, the losses of Germany: 74 million - 52 million + 5 million = 27 million people.

Consequently, the loss of the German population during the war was 27,000,000 people. About 9 million people emigrated from Germany.
Direct military losses of Germany - 18 million people. 8 million of them are civilians who died as a result of air raids by US and British aircraft, as a result of shelling. Germany lost about a third of its population! By October 1946, more than 13 million Volksdeutsche arrived in Western Germany from Alsace and Lorraine (about 2.2 million people Volksdeutsche) , Saara ( 0.8 million people ), Silesia (10 million people), Sudetenland ( 3.64 million people), Poznan (1 million people), Baltic States (2 million people), Danzig and Memel (0.54 million people) and other places. The population of Germany began to equal 66 million people. Persecution began against the German population outside the territory of the occupation zones. The Germans were thrown out of their homes and were often slaughtered in the streets. The non-German population spared neither children nor the elderly. It was because of this that the mass exodus of the Germans and those who collaborated with them began. The Kashubians with Schlenzaks considered themselves Germans. They also went to the western occupation zones.

“I forgive the Russians in advance for everything they do with Germany” (With)

This article discusses the losses suffered by the Red Army, the Wehrmacht and the troops of the satellite countries of the Third Reich, as well as the civilian population of the USSR and Germany, only in the period from 06/22/1941 until the end of hostilities in Europe

1. Losses of the USSR

According to the official data of the 1939 census, 170 million people lived in the USSR - significantly more than in any other single country in Europe. The entire population of Europe (excluding the USSR) was 400 million people. By the beginning of the Second World War, the population of the Soviet Union was different from the population of future opponents and allies. high level mortality and low life expectancy. Nevertheless, the high birth rate ensured a significant increase in the population (2% in 1938–39). Also, the difference from Europe was in the youth of the population of the USSR: the proportion of children under 15 years old was 35%. It was this feature that made it possible relatively quickly (within 10 years) to restore the pre-war population. The share of the urban population was only 32% (for comparison: in the UK - more than 80%, in France - 50%, in Germany - 70%, in the USA - 60%, and only in Japan did it have the same value as in THE USSR).

In 1939, the population of the USSR increased markedly after the entry into the country of new regions (Western Ukraine and Belarus, the Baltic states, Bukovina and Bessarabia), whose population ranged from 20 to 22.5 million people. The total population of the USSR, according to the certificate of the CSB on January 1, 1941, was determined at 198,588 thousand people (including the RSFSR - 111,745 thousand people). According to modern estimates, it was still less, and on June 1, 41 it was 196.7 million people.

Population of some countries for 1938–40

USSR - 170.6 (196.7) million people;
Germany - 77.4 million people;
France - 40.1 million people;
Great Britain - 51.1 million people;
Italy - 42.4 million people;
Finland - 3.8 million people;
USA - 132.1 million people;
Japan - 71.9 million people.

By 1940, the population of the Reich had increased to 90 million people, and taking into account satellites and conquered countries - 297 million people. By December 1941, the USSR had lost 7% of the country's territory, on which 74.5 million people lived before the start of the Second World War. This once again emphasizes that despite Hitler's assurances, the USSR had no advantages in human resources over the Third Reich.

During the entire period of the Great Patriotic War in our country, 34.5 million people wore military uniform. This amounted to about 70% of the total number of men aged 15–49 in 1941. The number of women in the Red Army was approximately 500,000. The percentage of those called up was higher only in Germany, but as we said earlier, the Germans covered the labor shortage at the expense of European workers and prisoners of war. In the USSR, such a deficit was covered by the increased length of the working day and the widespread use of the labor of women, children and the elderly.

For a long time, the USSR did not talk about direct irretrievable losses of the Red Army. In a private conversation, Marshal Konev in 1962 called the figure 10 million people, the well-known defector - Colonel Kalinov, who fled to the West in 1949 - 13.6 million people. The figure of 10 million people was published in the French version of the book "Wars and Population" by B. Ts. Urlanis, a well-known Soviet demographer. In 1993 and 2001, the authors of the well-known monograph “Secrecy Removed” (edited by G. Krivosheev) published the figure of 8.7 million people; at the moment, it is indicated in most reference literature. But the authors themselves state that it does not include: 500,000 conscripts called up for mobilization and captured by the enemy, but not included in the lists of units and formations. Also, the almost completely dead militiamen of Moscow, Leningrad, Kyiv and others are not taken into account. major cities. Currently the most complete lists irretrievable losses of Soviet soldiers amount to 13.7 million people, but approximately 12-15% of the records are repeated. According to the article " Dead Souls Great Patriotic War" ("NG", 06/22/99), the historical and archival search center "Fate" of the "War Memorials" association found that due to double and even triple counting, the number of dead soldiers of the 43rd and 2nd Shock armies in the studied the center of the battles was overestimated by 10-12%. Since these figures refer to the period when accounting for losses in the Red Army was not accurate enough, it can be assumed that in the whole war, due to double counting, the number of dead Red Army soldiers is overestimated by about 5–7%, i.e., by 0.2– 0.4 million people

On the issue of prisoners. The American researcher A. Dallin, according to archival German data, estimates their number at 5.7 million people. Of these, 3.8 million died in captivity, that is, 63%. Domestic historians estimate the number of captured Red Army soldiers at 4.6 million people, of which 2.9 million died. Unlike German sources, this does not include civilians (for example, railway workers), as well as seriously wounded who remained on the battlefield occupied by the enemy, and subsequently died from wounds or shot (about 470-500 thousand). The situation of prisoners of war was especially desperate in the first year of the war, when more than half of their total number (2.8 million people) was captured, and their labor had not yet been used in interests of the Reich. Open-air camps, hunger and cold, disease and lack of medicine, the most cruel treatment, mass shootings sick and incapable of work, and simply all objectionable, primarily commissars and Jews. Unable to cope with the flow of prisoners and guided by political and propaganda motives, the occupiers in 1941 sent home over 300 thousand prisoners of war, mainly natives of western Ukraine and Belarus. Subsequently, this practice was discontinued.

Also, do not forget that approximately 1 million prisoners of war were transferred from captivity to the auxiliary units of the Wehrmacht. In many cases, this was the only chance for prisoners to survive. Again, most of these people, according to German data, at the first opportunity tried to desert from units and formations of the Wehrmacht. In the local auxiliary forces of the German army stood out:

1) voluntary helpers (hiwi)
2) order service (one)
3) front-line auxiliary parts (noise)
4) police and defense teams (gema).

At the beginning of 1943, the Wehrmacht operated: up to 400 thousand Khivs, from 60 to 70 thousand Odies, and 80 thousand in the eastern battalions.

Some of the prisoners of war and the population of the occupied territories made a conscious choice in favor of cooperation with the Germans. So, in the SS division "Galicia" for 13,000 "places" there were 82,000 volunteers. More than 100 thousand Latvians, 36 thousand Lithuanians and 10 thousand Estonians served in the German army, mainly in the SS troops.

In addition, several million people from the occupied territories were deported to forced labor in the Reich. The ChGK (Extraordinary State Commission) immediately after the war estimated their number at 4.259 million people. More recent studies give a figure of 5.45 million people, of which 850-1000 thousand died.

Estimates of the direct physical extermination of the civilian population, according to the ChGK of 1946.

RSFSR - 706 thousand people.
Ukrainian SSR - 3256.2 thousand people.
BSSR - 1547 thousand people
Lit. SSR - 437.5 thousand people.
Lat. SSR - 313.8 thousand people.
Est. SSR - 61.3 thousand people.
Mold. SSR - 61 thousand people.
Karelo-Fin. SSR - 8 thousand people. (10)

Another important question. How many former Soviet citizens chose not to return to the USSR after the end of the Great Patriotic War? According to Soviet archival data, the number of "second emigration" was 620 thousand people. 170,000 Germans, Bessarabians and Bukovinians, 150,000 Ukrainians, 109,000 Latvians, 230,000 Estonians and Lithuanians, and only 32,000 Russians. Today, this estimate seems to be clearly underestimated. According to modern data, emigration from the USSR amounted to 1.3 million people. Which gives us a difference of almost 700 thousand, previously attributed to irretrievable losses of the population.

For twenty years, the main estimate of the losses of the Red Army was the figure of 20 million people, “far-fetched” by N. Khrushchev. In 1990, as a result of the work of a special commission of the General Staff and the USSR State Statistics Committee, a more reasonable estimate of 26.6 million people appeared. At the moment it is official. Attention is drawn to the fact that back in 1948, the American sociologist Timashev gave an assessment of the losses of the USSR in the war, which practically coincided with the assessment of the General Staff Commission. Maksudov's assessment made in 1977 also coincides with the data of the Krivosheev Commission. According to the commission of G. F. Krivosheev.

So let's summarize:

Post-war estimate of the losses of the Red Army: 7 million people.
Timashev: Red Army - 12.2 million people, civilian population 14.2 million people, direct casualties 26.4 million people, total demographic 37.3 million.
Arntts and Khrushchev: direct human: 20 million people.
Biraben and Solzhenitsyn: Red Army 20 million people, civilian population 22.6 million people, direct human resources 42.6 million, total demographic 62.9 million people.
Maksudov: Red Army - 11.8 million people, civilian population 12.7 million people, direct casualties 24.5 million people. It is impossible not to make a reservation that S. Maksudov (A.P. Babenyshev, Harvard University, USA) determined the purely combat losses of the spacecraft at 8.8 million people
Rybakovsky: direct human 30 million people.
Andreev, Darsky, Kharkov (General Staff, Krivosheev Commission): direct combat losses of the Red Army 8.7 million (11,994 including prisoners of war) people. Civilian population (including prisoners of war) 17.9 million people. Direct human losses 26.6 million people.
B. Sokolov: the loss of the Red Army - 26 million people
M. Harrison: total losses of the USSR - 23.9 - 25.8 million people.

The estimate of the losses of the Red Army, given in 1947 (7 million) is not credible, because not all calculations, even with imperfections Soviet system have been completed.

Khrushchev's assessment is also not confirmed. On the other hand, the “Solzhenitsyn” 20 million people lost only to the army or even 44 million are just as unfounded (without denying some talent of A. Solzhenitsyn as a writer, all the facts and figures in his writings are not confirmed by a single document and understand where he came from that took - impossible).

Boris Sokolov is trying to explain to us that the losses of the armed forces of the USSR alone amounted to 26 million people. He is guided by the indirect method of calculations. The losses of the officers of the Red Army are quite accurately known, according to Sokolov, this is 784 thousand people (1941–44). , displays the ratio of the losses of the officer corps to the rank and file of the Wehrmacht, as 1:25, that is, 4%. And, without hesitation, he extrapolates this technique to the Red Army, receiving his own 26 million irretrievable losses. However, this approach, on closer examination, turns out to be inherently false. Firstly, 4% of officer losses is not an upper limit, for example, in the Polish campaign, the Wehrmacht lost 12% of officers to the total losses of the Armed Forces. Secondly, it would be useful for Mr. Sokolov to know that with the regular strength of the German infantry regiment of 3049 officers, there were 75 people in it, that is, 2.5%. And in the Soviet infantry regiment, with a strength of 1582 people, there are 159 officers, i.e. 10%. Thirdly, appealing to the Wehrmacht, Sokolov forgets that the more combat experience in the troops, the lower the losses among officers. In the Polish campaign, the loss of German officers? 12%, in the French - 7%, and on the Eastern Front already 4%.

The same can be applied to the Red Army: if at the end of the war the loss of officers (not according to Sokolov, but according to statistics) was 8-9%, then at the beginning of the Second World War it could have been 24%. It turns out, like a schizophrenic, everything is logical and correct, only the initial premise is incorrect. Why did we dwell on Sokolov's theory in such detail? Yes, because Mr. Sokolov very often sets out his figures in the media.

In view of the foregoing, discarding the obviously underestimated and overestimated estimates of losses, we get: the Krivosheev Commission - 8.7 million people (with prisoners of war 11.994 million data for 2001), Maksudov - the losses are even slightly lower than the official ones - 11.8 million people. (1977? 93), Timashev - 12.2 million people. (1948). The opinion of M. Harrison can also be included here, with the level of total losses indicated by him, the losses of the army should fit into this interval. These data were obtained by various calculation methods, since both Timashev and Maksudov, respectively, did not have access to the archives of the USSR and Russian Defense Ministry. It seems that the losses of the USSR Armed Forces in the Second World War lie very close to such a "heap" group of results. Let's not forget that these figures include 2.6-3.2 million destroyed Soviet prisoners of war.

In conclusion, one should probably agree with Maksudov's opinion that the emigration outflow, which amounted to 1.3 million people, should be excluded from the number of losses, which was not taken into account in the study of the General Staff. By this value, the value of the losses of the USSR in the Second World War should be reduced. In percentage terms, the structure of losses of the USSR looks like this:

41% - aircraft losses (including prisoners of war)
35% - aircraft losses (without prisoners of war, i.e. direct combat)
39% - loss of the population of the occupied territories and the front line (45% with prisoners of war)
8% - home front population
6% - GULAG
6% - emigration outflow.

2. Losses of the Wehrmacht and SS troops

To date, there are no sufficiently reliable figures for the losses of the German army, obtained by direct statistical calculation. This is explained by the absence, for various reasons, of reliable source statistics on German losses.

According to Russian sources, 3,172,300 Wehrmacht soldiers were captured by Soviet troops, of which 2,388,443 were Germans in the NKVD camps. According to estimates by German historians, there were only about 3.1 million German servicemen in Soviet prisoner of war camps. The discrepancy, as you can see, is about 0.7 million people. This discrepancy is explained by differences in the estimate of the number of Germans who died in captivity: according to Russian archival documents, 356,700 Germans died in Soviet captivity, and according to German researchers, approximately 1.1 million people. It seems that the Russian figure of the Germans who died in captivity is more reliable, and the missing 0.7 million Germans who went missing and did not return from captivity actually died not in captivity, but on the battlefield.

The vast majority of publications devoted to calculations of the combat demographic losses of the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS troops are based on data from the central bureau (department) for recording the losses of personnel of the armed forces belonging to the German General base supreme command. Moreover, while denying the reliability of Soviet statistics, the German data are regarded as absolutely reliable. But upon closer examination, it turned out that the opinion about the high reliability of the information of this department was greatly exaggerated. Thus, the German historian R. Overmans in the article “The human casualties of the Second World War in Germany” came to the conclusion that “... the channels of information in the Wehrmacht do not reveal the degree of reliability that some authors attribute to them.” As an example, he reports that “... the official conclusion of the loss department at the headquarters of the Wehrmacht, relating to 1944, documented that the losses that were incurred during the Polish, French and Norwegian campaigns and the identification of which did not represent any technical difficulties were almost twice as high as originally reported." According to Muller-Gillebrand, which many researchers believe, the demographic losses of the Wehrmacht amounted to 3.2 million people. Another 0.8 million died in captivity. However, according to a certificate from the organizational department of the OKH dated May 1, 1945, only the ground forces, including the SS troops (without the Air Force and Navy), for the period from September 1, 1939 to May 1, 1945, lost 4 million 617.0 thousand people. people This is the most recent report on the losses of the German Armed Forces. In addition, from mid-April 1945, there was no centralized accounting of losses. And since the beginning of 1945, the data is incomplete. It remains a fact that in one of the last radio broadcasts with his participation, Hitler announced the figure of 12.5 million total losses of the German Armed Forces, of which 6.7 million are irretrievable, which exceeds the Müller-Hillebrand data by about two times. This was in March 1945. I do not think that in two months the soldiers of the Red Army did not kill a single German.

There is another statistics of losses - the statistics of burials of Wehrmacht soldiers. According to the appendix to the law of the Federal Republic of Germany "On the preservation of burial places", the total number of German soldiers who are in recorded burials in the territory of the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries is 3 million 226 thousand people. (on the territory of the USSR alone - 2,330,000 burials). This figure can be taken as the starting point for calculating the demographic losses of the Wehrmacht, but it also needs to be adjusted.

Firstly, this figure takes into account only the burial places of the Germans, and fought as part of the Wehrmacht big number soldiers of other nationalities: Austrians (of which 270 thousand people died), Sudeten Germans and Alsatians (230 thousand people died) and representatives of other nationalities and states (357 thousand people died). From total number dead soldiers of the Wehrmacht of non-German nationality, the Soviet-German front accounts for 75-80%, i.e. 0.6-0.7 million people.

Secondly, this figure refers to the beginning of the 90s of the last century. Since then, the search for German graves in Russia, the CIS countries and Eastern Europe has continued. And the messages that appeared on this topic were not informative enough. Unfortunately, no generalized statistics of the newly discovered graves of Wehrmacht soldiers could be found. Tentatively, it can be assumed that the number of newly discovered graves of Wehrmacht soldiers over the past 10 years is in the range of 0.2–0.4 million people.

Third, many burial places of the dead soldiers of the Wehrmacht on Soviet soil disappeared or were deliberately destroyed. Approximately 0.4–0.6 million Wehrmacht soldiers could be buried in such disappeared and nameless graves.

Fourth, these data do not include burials of German soldiers killed in battles with Soviet troops in Germany and Western European countries. According to R. Overmans, only in the last three spring months of the war, about 1 million people died. (minimum estimate 700 thousand) In general, on German soil and in Western European countries, approximately 1.2–1.5 million Wehrmacht soldiers died in battles with the Red Army.

Finally, fifth, among the buried were Wehrmacht soldiers who died of "natural" death (0.1-0.2 million people)

Major General V. Gurkin's articles are devoted to assessing the losses of the Wehrmacht using the balance of the German armed forces during the war years. Its calculated figures are given in the second column of Table. 4. Here, attention is drawn to two figures characterizing the number of Wehrmacht soldiers mobilized during the war, and the number of prisoners of war of Wehrmacht soldiers. The number of those mobilized during the war years (17.9 million people) is taken from the book by B. Müller-Hillebrand “The German Land Army 1933-1945”, vol.Z. At the same time, V.P. Bokhar believes that more were drafted into the Wehrmacht - 19 million people.

The number of prisoners of war of the Wehrmacht was determined by V. Gurkin by summing up the prisoners of war taken by the Red Army (3.178 million people) and the allied forces (4.209 million people) until May 9, 1945. In my opinion, this number is too high: it also included prisoners of war who were not soldiers of the Wehrmacht. The book by Paul Karel and Ponter Beddecker “German Prisoners of War of the Second World War” states: “... In June 1945, the Allied Command became aware that there were 7,614,794 prisoners of war and unarmed military personnel in the “camps, of which 4,209,000 by the time capitulations were already in captivity." Among these 4.2 million German prisoners of war, in addition to Wehrmacht soldiers, there were many other people. For example, in the French camp of Vitrilet-François, among the prisoners, "the youngest was 15 years old, the oldest was almost 70." The authors write about captive Volksturmites, about the organization by the Americans of special "children's" camps, where captured twelve-thirteen-year-old boys from the "Hitler Youth" and "Werewolf" were gathered. Mention is made of the placement in camps even of the handicapped.

In general, among the 4.2 million prisoners of war taken by the Allies before May 9, 1945, approximately 20–25% were not Wehrmacht soldiers. This means that the Allies had 3.1–3.3 million Wehrmacht soldiers in captivity.

The total number of Wehrmacht soldiers who were captured before the surrender was 6.3-6.5 million people.

In general, the demographic combat losses of the Wehrmacht and SS troops on the Soviet-German front are 5.2–6.3 million people, of which 0.36 million died in captivity, and irretrievable losses (including prisoners) 8.2 -9.1 million people It should also be noted that domestic historiography before recent years did not mention some data on the number of Wehrmacht prisoners of war at the end of hostilities in Europe, apparently for ideological reasons, because it is much more pleasant to assume that Europe "fought" against fascism than to realize that a certain and very large number of Europeans deliberately fought in the Wehrmacht. So, according to a note by General Antonov, on May 25, 1945. The Red Army captured 5 million 20 thousand Wehrmacht soldiers alone, of which 600 thousand people (Austrians, Czechs, Slovaks, Slovenes, Poles, etc.) were released before August after filtration measures, and these prisoners of war were sent to camps The NKVD did not send. Thus, the irretrievable losses of the Wehrmacht in battles with the Red Army can be even higher (about 0.6 - 0.8 million people).

There is another way to "calculate" the losses of Germany and the Third Reich in the war against the USSR. Quite correct, by the way. Let's try to "substitute" the figures relating to Germany into the methodology for calculating the total demographic losses of the USSR. And we will use ONLY the official data of the German side. Thus, the population of Germany in 1939, according to Müller-Hillebrandt (p. 700 of his work, so beloved by supporters of the theory of "clouding with corpses"), was 80.6 million people. At the same time, you and I, the reader, must take into account that this includes 6.76 million Austrians, and the population of the Sudetenland - another 3.64 million people. That is, the population of Germany proper within the borders of 1933 in 1939 was (80.6 - 6.76 - 3.64) 70.2 million people. We figured out these simple mathematical operations. Further: natural mortality in the USSR was 1.5% per year, but in countries Western Europe mortality was much lower and amounted to 0.6 - 0.8% per year, Germany was no exception. However, the birth rate in the USSR exceeded the European one in approximately the same proportion, due to which the USSR had a consistently high population growth throughout the pre-war years, starting from 1934.

We know about the results of the post-war population census in the USSR, but few people know that a similar population census was conducted by the Allied occupation authorities on October 29, 1946 in Germany. The census gave the following results:

Soviet zone of occupation (without East Berlin): men - 7.419 million, women - 9.914 million, total: 17.333 million people.
All western zones of occupation, (without western Berlin): men - 20.614 million, women - 24.804 million, total: 45.418 million people.
Berlin (all sectors of occupation), men - 1.29 million, women - 1.89 million, total: 3.18 million people.
The total population of Germany is 65,931,000 people.

A purely arithmetic operation of 70.2 million - 66 million, it seems, gives a decrease of only 4.2 million. However, everything is not so simple.

At the time of the census in the USSR, the number of children born since the beginning of 1941 was about 11 million, the birth rate in the USSR during the war years fell sharply and amounted to only 1.37% per year of the pre-war population. The birth rate in Germany and in peacetime did not exceed 2% per year of the population. Suppose it fell only 2 times, and not 3, as in the USSR. That is, the natural increase in the population during the years of the war and the first post-war year was about 5% of the pre-war population, and in numbers amounted to 3.5-3.8 million children. This figure must be added to the final figure of the decline in the population of Germany. Now the arithmetic is different: the total population loss is 4.2 million + 3.5 million = 7.7 million people. But this is not the final figure either; for completeness of calculations, we need to subtract from the figure of population loss the figure of natural mortality for the years of the war and 1946, which is 2.8 million people (let's take the figure of 0.8% to be "higher"). Now the total decline in the population of Germany, caused by the war, is 4.9 million people. Which, in general, is very “similar” to the figure of the irretrievable losses of the Reich ground forces, given by Müller-Gillebrandt. So what did the USSR, which lost 26.6 million of its citizens in the war, really “fill up with corpses” of its enemy? Patience, dear reader, let's still bring our calculations to their logical conclusion.

The fact is that the population of Germany proper in 1946 grew by at least another 6.5 million people, and presumably even by 8 million! By the time of the 1946 census (according to German, by the way, data published back in 1996 by the "Union of Exiles", and in total about 15 million Germans were "forcibly displaced") only from the Sudetenland, Poznan and Upper Silesia were evicted to Germany 6.5 million Germans. About 1 - 1.5 million Germans fled from Alsace and Lorraine (unfortunately, there are no more accurate data). That is, these 6.5 - 8 million must be added to the losses of Germany proper. And these are “slightly” different figures: 4.9 million + 7.25 million (arithmetic average of the number of Germans “expelled” to their homeland) = 12.15 million. Actually, this is 17.3% (!) of the German population in 1939. Well, that's not all!

I emphasize once again: the Third Reich is not even ONLY Germany at all! By the time of the attack on the USSR, the Third Reich “officially” included: Germany (70.2 million people), Austria (6.76 million people), Sudetenland (3.64 million people), captured from Poland "Baltic corridor", Poznan and Upper Silesia (9.36 million people), Luxembourg, Lorraine and Alsace (2.2 million people), and even Upper Corinthia cut off from Yugoslavia, a total of 92.16 million people.

The procedure for calculating the total human losses of Germany

The population in 1939 was 70.2 million people.
The population in 1946 was 65.93 million people.
Natural mortality 2.8 million people.
Natural increase (birth rate) 3.5 million people.
Emigration inflow of 7.25 million people.
Total losses ((70.2 - 65.93 - 2.8) + 3.5 + 7.25 = 12.22) 12.15 million people.

Every tenth German died! Every twelfth was captured!!!

Conclusion

The irretrievable losses of the USSR Armed Forces in the Second World War amount to 11.5 - 12.0 million people irrevocably, with actual combat demographic losses of 8.7-9.3 million people. The losses of the Wehrmacht and the SS troops on the Eastern Front amount to 8.0 - 8.9 million people irrevocably, of which 5.2-6.1 million are purely combat demographics (including those who died in captivity) people. In addition to the losses of the German Armed Forces themselves on the Eastern Front, it is necessary to add the losses of the satellite countries, and this is neither more nor less than 850 thousand (including those who died in captivity) people killed and more than 600 thousand prisoners. Total 12.0 (largest) million versus 9.05 (lowest) million.

A logical question: where is the “filling up with corpses”, about which Western, and now domestic “open” and “democratic” sources talk so much? The percentage of dead Soviet prisoners of war, even according to the most benign estimates, is at least 55%, and German, according to the largest, no more than 23%. Maybe the whole difference in losses is explained simply by the inhuman conditions of the prisoners?

The author is aware that these articles differ from the latest officially proclaimed version of the losses: the losses of the USSR Armed Forces - 6.8 million servicemen killed, and 4.4 million captured and missing, Germany's losses - 4.046 million servicemen dead, dead from wounds, missing (including 442.1 thousand dead in captivity), the loss of satellite countries 806 thousand killed and 662 thousand prisoners. Irretrievable losses of the armies of the USSR and Germany (including prisoners of war) - 11.5 million and 8.6 million people. The total loss of Germany 11.2 million people. (for example on Wikipedia)

The issue with the civilian population is more terrible against 14.4 (the smallest number) million people of the victims of the Second World War in the USSR - 3.2 million people (the largest number) of victims from the German side. So who fought with whom? It is also necessary to mention that without denying the Holocaust of the Jews, the German society still does not perceive the "Slavic" Holocaust, if everything is known about the suffering of the Jewish people in the West (thousands of works), then they prefer to "modestly" keep quiet about the crimes against the Slavic peoples.

I would like to end the article with the phrase of an unknown British officer. When he saw a column of Soviet prisoners of war being driven past the "international" camp, he said:

“I forgive the Russians in advance for everything they do with Germany”

Assessment of the ratio of losses based on the results of a comparative analysis of losses in the wars of the last two centuries

The application of the method of comparative analysis, the foundations of which were laid by Jomini, to the assessment of the ratio of losses requires statistical data on wars of different eras. Unfortunately, more or less complete statistics are available only for the wars of the last two centuries. Data on irretrievable combat losses in 19th wars and XX centuries, summarized by the results of the work of domestic and foreign historians, are given in Table. The last three columns of the table demonstrate the obvious dependence of the outcome of the war on the magnitude of the relative losses (losses expressed as a percentage of the total number of the army) - the relative losses of the winner in the war are always less than that of the vanquished, and this dependence has a stable, recurring character (it is valid for all types of wars), that is, it has all the features of the law.

This law - let's call it the law of relative losses - can be formulated as follows: in any war, victory goes to the army that has the least relative losses.

Note that the absolute numbers of irretrievable losses for the victorious side can be either less (Patriotic War of 1812, Russian-Turkish, Franco-Prussian wars), or more than those of the defeated side (Crimean, World War I, Soviet-Finnish) , but the relative losses of the winner are always less than those of the loser.

The difference between the relative losses of the winner and the loser characterizes the degree of persuasiveness of the victory. Wars with close values ​​of the relative losses of the parties end with peace treaties with the defeated side retaining the existing political system and army (for example, the Russo-Japanese War). In wars ending like the Great Patriotic War, complete capitulation of the enemy (Napoleonic wars, Franco-Prussian war of 1870–1871), the relative losses of the winner are significantly less than the relative losses of the vanquished (by at least 30%). In other words, the greater the loss, the greater must be the size of the army in order to win a convincing victory. If the losses of an army are 2 times greater than those of the enemy, then in order to win the war, its strength must be at least 2.6 times the strength of the opposing army.

And now let's return to the Great Patriotic War and see what human resources the USSR and Nazi Germany had during the war. Available data on the strength of the opposing sides on the Soviet-German front are given in Table. 6.

From Table. 6 it follows that the number of Soviet participants in the war was only 1.4-1.5 times the total number of opposing troops and 1.6-1.8 times the regular German army. In accordance with the law of relative losses, with such an excess in the number of participants in the war, the losses of the Red Army, which destroyed the fascist military machine, in principle could not exceed the losses of the armies of the fascist bloc by more than 10-15%, and the losses of regular German troops - by more than 25-30 %. This means that the upper limit of the ratio of irretrievable combat losses of the Red Army and the Wehrmacht is the ratio of 1.3:1.

The figures for the ratio of irretrievable combat losses given in Table. 6 do not exceed the value of the upper limit of the loss ratio obtained above. However, this does not mean that they are final and not subject to change.

As new documents, statistical materials, research results appear, the losses of the Red Army and the Wehrmacht (Tables 1-5) may be refined, changed in one direction or another, their ratio may also change, but it cannot be higher than 1.3: 1 .

Sources:

1. Central Statistical Bureau of the USSR "Number, composition and movement of the population of the USSR" M 1965
2. "The population of Russia in the 20th century" M. 2001
3. Arntts "Casual losses in the Second World War" M. 1957
4. Frumkin G. Population Changes in Europe since 1939 N.Y. 1951
5. Dallin A. German rule in Russia 1941–1945 N.Y.- London 1957
6. "Russia and the USSR in the wars of the 20th century" M.2001
7. Polyan P. Victims of two dictatorships M. 1996.
8. Thorwald J. The Illusion. Soviet soldiers in Hitler,s Army N. Y. 1975
9. Collection of emergency messages state commission M. 1946
10. Zemskov. Birth of the second emigration 1944–1952 SI 1991 No. 4
11. Timasheff N. S. The postwar population of the Soviet Union 1948
13 Timasheff N. S. The postwar population of the Soviet Union 1948
14. Arnts. Human losses in World War II M. 1957; "International Life" 1961 No. 12
15. Biraben J. N. Population 1976.
16. Maksudov S. Population losses in the USSR Benson (Vt) 1989.; "About the front-line losses of the SA during the Second World War" "Free Thought" 1993. No. 10
17. The population of the USSR for 70 years. Edited by Rybakovsky L. L. M 1988
18. Andreev, Darsky, Kharkov. "Population of the Soviet Union 1922–1991" M 1993
19. Sokolov B. "Novaya Gazeta" No. 22, 2005, "The Price of Victory -" M. 1991
20. Germany's War against the Soviet Union 1941-1945, edited by Reinhard Ruhrup 1991. Berlin
21. Müller-Gillebrand. "Land Army of Germany 1933-1945" M.1998
22. Germany's War against the Soviet Union 1941-1945, edited by Reinhard Ruhrup 1991. Berlin
23. Gurkin V. V. About human losses on the Soviet-German front in 1941–45. NiNI No. 3 1992
24. M. B. Denisenko. WWII in the demographic dimension "Eksmo" 2005
25. S. Maksudov. The loss of the population of the USSR during the Second World War. "Population and Society" 1995
26. Yu. Mukhin. If not for the generals. "Yauza" 2006
27. V. Kozhinov. Great War Russia. Series of lectures 1000th anniversary of Russian wars. "Yauza" 2005
28. Materials of the newspaper "Duel"
29. E. Beevor "The Fall of Berlin" M.2003

Literature

The United States was forced into the war on December 7, 1941, as a result of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. And although the scope of the battles was not the same as on Eastern Front, this does not negate their bitterness. Getting bogged down in battles with the Japanese, the United States was able to secure the rear of the USSR, and subsequently opening a second front, brought Germany's defeat closer and made its collapse inevitable. In total, the main losses in World War II are due to the following factors:

The contribution of the Allies to victory cannot be underestimated. In fact, while fierce battles were going on in the east and the blitzkrieg thundered, Great Britain and the United States also did not sit idly by, stretching the forces of the Germans and their allies in several directions, thereby reducing the pressure on the USSR.

During the entire war in the United States, a huge number of recruits were mobilized - more than 16 million people. Such reserves were enough to fight long wars of attrition, in addition, the American soldiers did not have the worst level of training, which allowed them to withstand even superior enemy forces.

After the unexpected attack on Pearl Harbor and the destruction of one of the most powerful military bases, the United States entered the war. Just hours after the attack, the Americans declared war on Japan and began planning their response.

Starting from 1942, the Japanese army lost its advantage and stopped gaining significant victories, which led to the defeat in the Battle of Midway, and dealt a crushing blow to the imperial troops.

After that, the Americans continued their systematic offensive, freeing all the islands that came across on the way. The Japanese refused to capitulate, even when they found themselves in a completely stalemate in 1945. Anticipating heavy losses at the beginning of the assault on the main island of Japan, the US command decided to drop two atomic bombs, which finally broke the spirit of the Japanese and led to the subsequent complete surrender.

In total, during the war with the Japanese, the Americans lost about 300 thousand soldiers and sailors killed, captured and subsequently died from wounds. In addition, it is known about the injured civilians. So the Japanese managed to intern more than 12 thousand civilians.

One of the main "meat grinders" - the place where the Allies suffered the greatest losses - was the beaches during Operation Overlord. The infantry had to storm the enemy bunkers, advancing across open terrain, under furious artillery and machine gun fire. However, due to the disagreements of the German commanders, who as a result could not provide organized assistance to each other, the defense was broken through. The battle for Normandy went on for about two months. The main task of the allies was to capture, expand and strengthen the coastal bridgeheads in order to create favorable conditions for subsequent attacks on the enemy. This operation went down in history as the largest landing, as it involved more than 3 million soldiers who crossed the English Channel.

Great losses were inflicted on the allies by powerful German armored vehicles - the outdated military doctrine affected. The main tank of the US Army at that time was the M4 Sherman, equipped with a short-barreled 75-mm gun, which was not able to adequately deal with enemy tanks that destroyed Shermans at distances of more than a kilometer. The use of specialized self-propelled guns did not give significant results, which is why the Americans lost heavily to the mechanized divisions of the Wehrmacht. As a result, due to the heavy casualties, the Americans had to quickly develop new types of tanks, as well as figure out how to modernize the current ones that remained in service.

Even despite the complete dominance of the Americans in the air, the German forces continued to offer serious resistance. Especially here the Hitler Youth managed to distinguish itself. Teenagers, under the guidance of experienced officers, managed to inflict enormous damage on American forces, turning French vineyards into a real hell. However, they didn't stand a chance, as the Americans were better trained and already had combat skills by the time the operation began. Some units had real combat experience gained during the battles with the Japanese. This played a cruel joke on the American Marines, since the Germans used completely different battle tactics, which also led to heavy losses at first.

In total, during the bloody battles in Europe, the United States lost almost 186,000 servicemen killed, which, of course, is quite small when compared with the losses of the USSR.

Conclusion

Undoubtedly, he made the biggest contribution to the victory over the Third Reich. Allies could only indirectly help Soviet troops, diverting the attention of the Wehrmacht command and forcing them to disperse their forces. They also supplied additional weapons for Soviet army under the lend-lease program. In total, US losses in World War II amounted to 405,000 killed and 671,000 wounded.