In the memoirs of veterans, as well as in photos and video chronicles of the Second World War,
you can encounter images of dozens and hundreds of rifles stuck in the ground with a bayonet.
This makes an ambiguous and almost surreal impression on any person. Well,
let's try to figure out a strange phenomenon.
"Bayonet to the ground" - this was the name of the German propaganda leaflets, which were scattered
by the Wehrmacht propaganda detachments over Soviet positions at the first stage of the war.
The leaflets contained texts in Russian with propaganda material. It could be very diverse.
As a rule, German agitation was reduced to several main directions: the war
is going badly for the USSR and will soon end, the children of the political leadership
have already surrendered and are cursing their own fathers, it is necessary to go
over to the side of the Reich in order to fight the oppression of the Bolsheviks.
In addition, leaflets could contain "classical" motives of anti-Bolshevik German propaganda
in the spirit that the Bolsheviks drink blood from the peoples of the Soviet Union.
In addition, the leaflets often contained copies of passes that allegedly allowed the person who
provided this pass to surrender freely to the soldiers of the Wehrmacht or SS. Of course,
the only true purpose of these "passes'' was still the same agitation and propaganda.
In the same leaflets it was often written that the Red Army soldiers could safely
surrender to the first soldier of the Reich by raising their hands,
shouting "Stalin Kaput!" or sticking their rifle bayonet into the ground.
In the first months of the war, many units of the Red Army were surrounded.
A huge number of people eventually surrendered,
deciding that the Germans would treat them as prisoners of war. It was a mistake.
The vast majority of those who surrendered were subsequently eliminated in concentration camps,
many Red Army soldiers were killed by Wehrmacht and SS soldiers before they reached camps. A huge
number of prisoners were starved to death or died of diseases in camps for "temporary" detention.
The more resolutely the Wehrmacht advanced in 1941-1942, the more actively the Germans engaged
in agitation and propaganda. The Soviet Union, in turn, conducted counter-propaganda, and the
commanders of military units and NKVD officers were authorised to stop and, if necessary, punish
Red Army soldiers for collecting enemy leaflets that were scattered from aeroplanes or thrown into
positions with the help of special artillery shells. There have been cases when Red Army
soldiers had problems due to the fact that they used such leaflets for hand-rolled cigarettes.
However, the German agitation had a rather weak effect on the units of the Red Army,
except in cases when the units got into a desperate situation.
Most often, people were moved to surrender not by hatred of the regime
(which the German agitation primarily counted on and what it was wrong about from the very
beginning), but by a completely understandable fear of death and hope for salvation.
As for the photos with rifles stuck in the ground, they can be both authentic and staged.
The Red Army soldiers who surrendered could really follow the instructions of the German agitation.
But it is very hard to believe that during the battle you will rise up in full height and stick
a rifle in the ground. Moreover, if you look at the photos of captured Red Army soldiers,
I have not seen a photo with rifles stuck in the ground in the background
behind the soldiers. What do you think dear subscribers is it fake or it was for real?
At the same time, it is impossible to deny the possibility that the propaganda
detachments of the Reich, after the defeat of the Red Army units, took staged photographs,
independently sticking the rifles of the killed or surrendered fighters into the ground.