Soviet losses in WWII to be adjusted - Defense Ministry

11:26 GMT, Jan 26, 2009

Soviet losses in WWII to be adjusted - Defense Ministry

MOSCOW. Jan 26 (Interfax-AVN) - Statistics on the casualties suffered by the Soviet Armed Forces during the Great Patriotic War will be adjusted with information that the Russian Defense Ministry has accumulated in its electronic general database. "As a result of analytical research and the introduction of certain changes to the database, data on the real loss of the Soviet Union in the Great patriotic War will be adjusted," the Rear of the Armed Forces said in a statement obtained by Interfax-AVN on Monday. Over 10.2 million pages of documents from 32,428 archives of the Defense Ministry's Central Archive and 30,590 passports of burial sites were analyzed, and 23 million entries were made to the database. Information on those killed and missing in other armed conflicts of the 20th century, which are stored in the Defense Ministry's archives,will in the future expand the database, the statement reads. The Russian Defense Ministry said earlier that the irretrievable casualties of the Soviet army during the Great Patriotic War amounted to 8.8604 million people.ar rp

Interfax: Soviet losses in WWII to be adjusted - Defense Ministry

 

David M. Glantz's tables give the total losses for the Soviet Armed forces as 29 million (including dead, captured, permanently wounded, etc.)

 

Ahhh but Wolfy, some are not to be counted...

 

Also:

Don't reinterpret WW2, Russia tells neighbors - Yahoo! News

ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) – President Dmitry Medvedev said on Tuesday Russia should resist attempts by some of its ex-Soviet neighbors to "falsify" the history of World War Two by underplaying Moscow's role in defeating Hitler.

"We should be tougher in defending our positions, to tell our partners the whole truth about falsifications of history, glorifying Nazi criminals in neighboring states," he told a meeting with government officials and public figures.

"There is no room for diplomatic niceties. I want the foreign ministry to take a more aggressive stance."

Medvedev was in St Petersburg for celebrations marking 65 years since the Red Army lifted in a 900-day Nazi siege of Russia's second city, then known as Leningrad.

 

So Russian battlefield losses are even more astronomical than previously thought? I believe Glantz's stats are from Russian archives.

 

This is so untrue ^^ well atleast in Lithuania... in Lithuania there were no ss except the home guard.

 

Did those Baltic SS divisions commit war crimes? And who didn't on the Eastern front...

 

Dose not matter how high they think it was as we will never know the real figure.

I except that the Soviet Union payed the heaviest price in WW2.

 

There is pretty rigorous scholarship on a region by region and unit by unit basis. The treatment of Jewish peoples in the Batlic states make somber reading, and I'd expect Baltic SS to have done plenty war crimes.

 

There is no doubt The Baltic States were the site of some pretty vile atrocities against the local Jewish populations after the Germans moved in, and I would expect the Baltic SS were no different than the regular civilians participating in the crimes.

 

I find it pretty interesting at their choice for terminology used when it comes to them admitting what their more believable losses numbers were-by changing from "Oops we lied" to "Adjusting" the numbers.

 

Yes it is. But at least they are open to revising the numbers. Though I believe also that we will never really know.

 

Medvedev orders precise Soviet WWII death toll

By IRINA TITOVA, Associated Press Writer Irina Titova, Associated Press Writer – 17 mins ago
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Tuesday ordered officials to determine the precise Soviet death toll in World War II as the nation marked the 65th anniversary of the battle that broke the Nazi siege of Leningrad.
Russia, which suffered hugely in the conflict it calls the Great Patriotic War, places substantial importance on commemorating its sacrifices. An estimated 27 million Soviet civilians and soldiers died in the war. Much of the western part of the country was ravaged during four years of epic battles.
"Data about our losses haven't been revealed yet," Medvedev said at a meeting with officials and veterans in the Konstantin Palace near St. Petersburg. "We must determine the historical truth."
Medvedev said that a special panel involving officials from various government agencies will be created for the purpose.
He said that more than 2.4 million people are still officially considered missing in action. Of the 9.5 million buried in mass graves, 6 million are unidentified, he said. Remains are still being found across western Russia and other ex-Soviet republics.
The meeting marked the anniversary of the battle that broke the siege of Leningrad on Jan. 27, 1944. The siege killed an estimated 1.5 million people.
Roza Ivanova, a 78-year old survivor who was in Medvedev's audience at a separate meeting with veterans later in the day, said she survived the siege thanks to animal skins her father brought from the tannery where he worked.
"We cooked a sort of stew out of those skins. The stew made of pork skin was especially good," Ivanova, who was 10 years old when Nazi troops closed in on the city, told The Associated Press.
Desperate for heat but without fuel, her family stoked their small cast-iron wood stove with shards of furniture and books.
"I remember how we wanted to eat and live then!" she said. "God save anyone from such experience."
Yulia Likhova, 72, who was 5 when the siege began, said she remembers a seaman sharing a loaf of bread with her and her four siblings. "It was such unbelievable happiness," she said.
To avoid starvation, Likhova said, she and her family boiled leather belts and drank a kind of broth made by boiling earth they gathered near a defunct food-storage warehouse where sugar had melted during the fire that destroyed it.
She and her siblings survived, but her mother and grandparents starved to death.
Medvedev used the occasion to condemn what he described as efforts to rehabilitate Nazis in some neighboring nations. Russia has harshly criticized authorities in the ex-Soviet Baltic nations of Estonia and Latvia for allowing gatherings of local veterans of Nazi SS units.
"We must toughen our stance on the issue," Medvedev said. "There is no room here for delicate diplomatic wording. Our stance must be more combative."
Medvedev also vowed military spending plans would not be cut as a result of the current financial crisis, and urged the government to provide free apartments to some 50,000 war veterans before Russia marks the 65th anniversary of the end of the fighting in Europe next year.

 

I think Carl summed it up pretty well, we are never going to know fully the extent of the supreme losses on the Soviets during the war, their archival folk are royal pains in the arse.....let's get over this shall we it's been voer 60 years, release the stinking info even if it embarrasses you all to death

 

I seriously doubt that there will ever be a "precise" accounting for all the war dead. Impossible.

 

Medvedev calls for clarity on WW II casualties

ST. PETERSBURG. Jan 27 (Interfax) - Russian President DmitryMedvedev has tasked Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov withtaking the preparation of official statistics on the WW II casualtiesunder his personal control. "Now that 65 years have passed since the war, information on ourcasualties has still not been published. We need to find historicaltruth," Medvedev told the Russian organizational committee Pobeda in St.Petersburg. An interdepartmental working group is currently being conducted toanalyze this information, Medvedev recalled. "I am asking the minister to take this issue under his personalcontrol," Medvedev said. The president also asked the Defense Ministry to prepare itsproposals on speeding up the work connected with bringing all militarygraves in order "promptly, by April 1, 2009." "We have to admit: some of these graves are in an unacceptablestate," Medvedev said. "Despite any crises, such work needs to be done. It is our duty,"the president said. Medvedev recalled that an appropriate instruction had earlier beengiven to the control division of the presidential administration. "Weneed to keep this issue under control," he said. "Over 2.4 million people are now missing, and the names of 6million of the 9.5 million military men who were buried in mass gravesremain unknown," Medvedev said. In all, there are over 47,000 militarygraves in Russia, the president said. Medvedev called on the government to take additional measures toensure coordination of the work of the regions in the care for militarygraves and monuments. He pointed out that responsibility for that restswith the regional authorities and local self-government bodies.Interfax: Medvedev calls for clarity on WW II casualties

 

Thanks E, JC, and yep-I fully believe it because of how often and how secretive the Russians have been in in the past about many issues including this one. Vera S/ is a friend of mine who visits the two John Wayne forums who lives and owns her own business in St. Petersburg-who lost several members of her family during the Great Patriotic War. Vera said that a few of them are still listed as having survive the war-and or still living. Of course that wasn't true as three of her Uncles-Brothers and Cousins-fell sometime at and during the Battle of Stalingrad. Vera thinks the offcials refuse to acknoledge true facts anf figures-of their losses there-and is possibly due to national pride - about them winning that great battle.

 

Your welcome Carl. I agree. I think that national pride plays a big part in this. It always looks better and honorable to have suffered more losses in defeating the Axis then suffering less. But not matter the final score. The Soviets were the ones that suffered the most casualties.

 

Wolfy,

The 29 million figure is not of Soviet Armed Forced but of the entire population. 20 million civilians lost their lives.


Military losses are around 9 million ( of which 3 million died of starvation in German POW camps ).

 

No, it is military losses included wounded and missing. I had the book right there when I typed it.