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p Long before the Second World War, the German General Staff bandied the bellicose slogan, "Attention, Panzers!" This epitomised its reckless strategy of aggression. Nazi generals expected the Wehrmacht armour to strike fear and consternation into the peoples of all countries, forcing them to their knees. What they did not reckon with was that panzers could be fought with superior armour. Neither did they reckon with the fact that panzers would not intimidate the Soviet people. A few months after the Soviet-German war began, the old slogan gave place to a panicky cry: "Attention, Partisans!" Victory chants gave place to hysterics.

p Many foreign historians ascribe the appearance and growth of the Soviet partisan movement to the nazi atrocities. Quite true that the atrocities fanned the flames of resistance. But there was one reason only for the movement to spring and grow: the enemy was about to overrun the homeland, to eradicate the gains of socialism, cherished by the Soviet people.

p If the iron fist were in a silk glove and German occupation policy were reversed, this would alter nothing. Goebbels, the nazi propaganda chief, was wrong when he said: "We could reduce danger from the partisans considerably if we succeeded in at least winning some of these peoples’ confidence — It might also be useful to set up sham governments in the various sectors which would then have to be responsible for unpleasant and unpopular measures."  [195•1 

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p Indeed, Goebbels’s advice was partly followed. A " Committee of Trust" was set up in Byelorussia, a “Self- Administration Committee" in Estonia and a variety of committees in the Ukraine. But all these auxiliary bodies, consisting of traitors and collaborationists, aroused bitter hatred and contempt.

p The nazis committed savage outrages. They shot, hung, poisoned or buried alive hundreds of thousands of guiltless civilians, to say nothing of Red Army soldiers and officers. Forcible transportation to German labour camps was widely practised. Soviet citizens shipped to Germany were placed in concentration camps or on farms, performing hard labour, constantly insulted, ill-fed, and in most cases finally dying from exhaustion or hunger, or as a result of brutal treatment by guards.

p But nothing could break the will of-Soviet people. Men and women in nazi-captured towns or villages rose against them.

p The patriotic struggle in^enemy-occupied territory unfolded in many ways— political, economic, ideological and armed.

p Political resistance took the form of distinct hostility to measures of the nazi governors, the system of plunder, coercion and abuse. The population ignored regulations of the occupation authorities, refused to believe their reports, rejected their slander of Soviet power and Soviet government bodies. All nazi attempts to subvert the people’s trust in the Communist Party were in vain. That trust only increased. Underground Party bodies were stoutly supported, this serving as a dependable basis for successful action. The most striking thing was that the collective-farm system continued ,in the countryside despite the fascist occupation, with the nazis even trying to adapt it to their needs and interests. Attempts to kindle distrust between workers and peasants, and between the different nationalities on occupied territory, failed dismally. What is more, as elsewhere in the country, the unity of the working class and the collective farmers only became- more solid, while people of different nationalities helped each other as best they could. Many Russian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian families risked their lives hiding Jews, who were being exterminated by the nazis.

p The Soviet socialist system showed its viability and endurance even in enemy-occupied territory. This struck fear into the German imperialists. They vented their fury against 197 members of the Communist Party, government officials and shock workers who fell into their hands, and against Soviet science and culture workers.

p Like many other enemies of the Soviet state, the German imperialists pretended to “liberate” the Soviet people from communism. But the moment they stepped on Soviet soil, which they bathed in the blood of guiltless victims, they discovered that communism and the life of the Soviet people were indivisible.

p Economic resistance in enemy-occupied territory was centred on preventing hitlerites from exploiting the available production capacity and resources. Workers, technicians and engineers working under duress for the occupation authorities, sabotaged production on their own initiative or by assignment of underground Party bodies. As a result, the economic policy of the German invaders collapsed and, as they confessed, they gained much less from production in occupied territory than they had expected.

p Probably the best showing was that of the Soviet workers, technicians and engineers in the Donets Basin, which had a strong underground Party organisation. The Germans were unable to organise coal extraction and iron and steel production there, and were compelled to ship in coal to the Ukraine, and even to the Donets Basin, from Western Europe.

p Soviet railwaymen put up a tough fight. Water towers, switches and other railway accessories kept breaking down, trains were derailed and locomotives went out of order. A small group of railwaymen led by K. S. Zaslonov in Orsha performed heroic exploits, organising manufacture of special mines methodically placed in locomotives and railway cars, thus disorganising railway traffic in the rear of nazi Army Group Centre.

p The nazis encountered active resistance also in the villages. Collective farmers avoided handing in food to the occupation authorities, sabotaging their orders, while supplying food to partisans and the underground. Nor did the partisans forget their loyal friends, wherever possible delivering them from the more brutal and ferocious administrators. "Many an agricultural functionary,” a German newspaper admitted, "paid for his activity with his life."  [197•1 

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p War is impossible without a well-ordered and organised rear. For the Wehrmacht Germany was a distant rear. Occupied Soviet land, however, though operationally the rear of the nazi armies, was nothing of the sort in the economic sense. It worked not for, but against Germany.

p Ideological Soviet resistance, guided by the Communists, made a strong impact too. The Soviet people wrathfully rejected the fascists’ man-hating anti-communist ideas. Only a wretched handful of traitors and collaborators, isolated and hated, agreed to serve the occupation authorities. The people as a whole proved faithful to Marxism-Leninism and the socialist ideal.

p Assassination of nazis, arson, damage to enemy communications and spreading rumours and panic among the invaders and their menials—all were part of a massive operation. Soviet people acted selflessly to preserve the nation’s property, buried machinery, tools and tractors, equipment and material, to prevent them from falling into enemy hands. This was evidence of a deep, faith in final victory and of loyalty to socialism.

p Young men and women were hidden away to escape transportation for-forced labour in Germany. On instructions of underground Party bodies, Soviet patriots agreed to be officials of labour exchanges and fascist municipalities, passport control officers, prisoners’ reshipment centres, even of the police, while physicians and nurses worked in polyclinics and labour selection centres. Huge numbers of fictitious documents were issued to partisans and underground Party bodies, and certificates of disablement to young people down for transportation to Germany.

p Millions took part in sabotage. This, coupled with ceaseless acts of diversion and armed partisan operations, all heroic national resistance, created an untenable situation, eroding fascist morale. Many citizens risked arrest or death, engaging Germans in conversation, proving that their aim of conquering the Soviet Union would fail.

p No matter how they tried, the invaders could not gain a firm foothold on Soviet soil. They were an alien body, and hostile, and were bound to be expelled. But this required military victory over the German armada.

p Soviet people remained fearless revolutionary fighters even in the frightful Gestapo prison cells and in the hell of the concentration camps. Neither torture nor execution could 199 break them. As a symbol of unbending tenacity and will, we may cite General D. M. Karbyshev, whom the nazis turned into a block of ice, the poet Mussah Jalil, executed in a nazi prison, and many others.

p In the bleak prison cells, in inhuman and terrifying conditions, Jalil wrote poetry filled with love of his country and life, with a bitter hatred and proud contempt of the fascist hangmen. Here (translated in blank verse —TV.) are some of his lines:

p I sang, sensing the freshness of spring, I sang, going to battle for my country. Now, I write my last song With the axe raised over my head. Song taught me to cherish freedom, Song orders me to die fighting. May my life be a song for my people, May my death be a song of struggle.  [199•1 

p Fourteen million were transported to do forced labour in Germany. This includes all foreign workers and prisoners of war. Soviet people stood out by reason of their unbending will-power, fighting spirit, morale. Weakened by hunger and excessive labour, strictly guarded, stripped of all rights, they resisted with unexampled courage and tenacity, forming underground committees and preparing armed risings, while comforting and supporting those who proved weak in body or spirit. Aided by the mass of prisoners, the committees established ties with foreign workers and German anti-fascists.

p A Soviet war prisoners’ fraternity, an underground organisation of Soviet patriots, was formed in southern Germany, establishing lasting relations with the Communist German anti-fascist organisation, the German Anti-Nazi Popular Front. Czechoslovak and Polish patriots doing forced labour co-operated actively with the Soviet underground. This was one of the most powerful anti-fascist organisations on German soil. Several thousand men of different nationalities, organised along military lines and partly armed, prepared for a rising against the Hitler dictatorship.” They failed to accomplish their plan, but the memory of their courageous bid will live forever.

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p The movements among Soviet people imprisoned or doing forced labour in Germany, had a strong bearing on the general situation. From 1943 onward, the nazis lived in fear of a possible insurrection of foreign workers and prisoners throughout Germany; so they kept part of their troops on German soil. Moreover, they went to the length of drafting a special operational plan under the code name, Valkyrie, for this eventuality. Soviet resistance reached out to the den of the nazi brutes.

p Soviet security agents performed feats that roused the admiration of the Soviet people. Supported by their countrymen, they sealed off the Soviet rear from enemy infiltration. The fact that only two out of the 150 spy and sabotage groups smuggled in by Abwehrkommando 104, a nazi intelligence unit, fulfilled their mission, shows how effectively Soviet security bodies operated. Archives captured by Soviet troops at the end of the war disclosed that 90 per cent of the agents sent into Soviet battle areas had been captured.  [200•1  Several thousand enemy agents were exposed and rendered harmless during the war. Parachuted nazi agents caught, alone totalled 1,854.  [200•2 

p Hundreds of the captured fascist agents were subsequently used to transmit false reports to the Germans. In December 1942, when an offensive was being prepared in the Volkhov direction, spurious information was dispatched to the nazis from Tikhvin, Bologoye, Vologda, Yaroslavl, Rybinsk, Bezhetsk, Kalinin, Moscow and Gorky. On the eve of the Battle of Kursk the nazi command was misled by reports from nine captured German agents operating under the control of Soviet counter-intelligence.  [200•3 

p Soviet intelligence supplied invaluable information about the dislocation and deployment of nazi troops and about Hitler’s operational plans. A group of intelligence officers headed by M. S. Prudnikov obtained and sent to Moscow 23 top secret German situation maps in June 1942. In spring 1943 a group known as Victors, operating behind the enemy lines, obtained early information about the move of several nazi infantry and panzer divisions to the Kursk battle area 201 from France, Africa and the Leningrad Front.  [201•1  V. A. Molodtsov organised a wide intelligence network from the enemyblockaded Odessa catacombs. When captured and sentenced to death, in reply to a nazi offer of pleading for mercy, he said: "We are in our own country and do not beg enemies for mercy."  [201•2 

p Foreign intelligence experts had a high opinion of what the Soviet patriots accomplished during tie war. Allen Dulles, head of US Intelligence, for one thing, noted that information obtained by Soviet officers was of a kind intelligence agencies in other countries could only dream of.

p For all the impact of political, economic and ideological resistance in enemy-occupied areas, more decisive was partisan warfare. It betokened a stirring patriotism and boundless loyalty to socialism, and that the war against the invader was a people’s war, testifying to the unbending will of Soviet patriots to defend the freedom and independence of their country. Naturally, in the armed struggle the main part belonged to the Soviet Armed Forces, whereas the partisan movement was the comrade-in-arms of Army, Navy and Air Force. It contributed to the victory and made a strong politico-military and international mark. It struck fear into the invaders,- who could never feel safe, wherever they may have been. To use an expression of that time, the partisan movement made Soviet soil burn under the soles of the invaders, so that soon they exclaimed in panic, "Attention, Partisans!"

p The country had a rich tradition of partisan warfare, going back to Ancient Rus and the partisan exploits in the Patriotic War of 1812 against the Napoleonic invasion. Partisans played a major role also in the fight against the interventionists and whiteguards in 1918-1922, when they helped defeat many an enemy of Soviet power in the Ukraine, Siberia and the Far East. But never before in Russian history was the partisan movement as sweeping as it was in the Great Patriotic War against Hitler Germany.

p It had many distinctive features: rooted in the thick of the masses, it was the response to the call of the Communist Party, which rallied the population in enemy-occupied territory. That is why the partisan flames spread so quickly. 202 Yet partisan warfare would have been inconceivable without extensive popular support. Partisans were fed, clothed, provided concealment and oriented by the people.

p The other important feature was the movement’s massiveness. Hundreds of thousands, with reserves reaching into the millions, took part in the partisan operations, including all segments of Soviet society: workers, farmers, office workers, intellectuals, old people, young men and women, Communists, Komsomols and non-Party people. By becoming partisans all of them displayed an equally high sense of patriotic duty, courage, heroism and dedication.

p The movement was monolithic. Its members pursued the same aim. There could be no thought of differences and quarrels. Unlike many capitalist countries, the partisan movement in the Soviet Union was unaffected either by class or national differences. The wretched efforts of a handful of nationalist-minded traitors, who sold out to the nazi occupation authorities, were unable to disrupt the unity of the partisan ranks.

p Many women were active in the partisan movement, staunch partisans, undergrounders, couriers, medical nurses, dynamiters and scouts coming from their midst. There are names that for Soviet people symbolise tenacity, courage and loyalty—those of A. V. Petrova, a partisan scout; Maria Melentyeva and Anna Lisitsina, message carriers; Vera Khorunzhaya, head of the Party underground in Vitebsk; Y. S. Zenkova, head of the Komsomol underground in Obol; Lyalia Ubiivovk, undergrounder in Poltava; Marite Melnikaite, a patriotic Lithuanian girl, and many others.

p Rising from the thick of the nation, led and guided by the Communist Party and Soviet Government, the partisan movement swept across enemy-occupied territory and grew into an important political and military-strategic factor in the defeat of fascist Germany and her allies in Europe.

p Partisan units were formed in different ways, some by local organisations of the Party, Komsomol, the Soviets or the trade unions, some by factory, collective-farm or statefarm groups, some on the initiative of the local population, servicemen separated from their units or escaped POWs, and some on the basis of groups specially sent into the enemy rear. Gradually, the units grew into larger detachments, establishing contact with each other and maintaining communications with the Red Army Command. They served 203 as a dependable base, facilitating the work of the underground and clandestine Party organisations in the enemy rear.

p The earliest units sprang up in areas first overrun by the enemy— the Baltic republics, Byelorussia, the Ukraine and Moldavia. Most prominent in Byelorussia were the units of T. P. Bumazhkov and F. I. Pavlovsky, V. Z. Korzh, M. I. Zhukovsky, M. F. Shmyryov and T. Ye. Yermakovich. Many units consisted of the population of entire villages. This was the case in the villages of Zagalye (Lyuban District) and Dromanovichi (Starobin District) where partisan detachments were headed by the chairman of the village Soviet and the chairman of the collective farm respectively. Units in the Baltic republics and the Ukraine were formed in a similar way. S. A. Kovpak, 55 years of age, formed a unit in the Ukrainian town of Putivl, growing into one of the most renowned partisan generals.

p Different people became partisans. Komsomol member V. A. Zebelov, a Moscow Law Institute student, who had lost both hands in an accident, asked to be sent behind the enemy lines. Told by Komsomol officials that no one in his condition had ever jumped with a parachute, Zebelov replied: "Nowhere except in our country is there Soviet power."  [203•1  His request was granted and he proved an excellent partisan scout. Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, a Moscow schoolgirl, went on a partisan mission, and was apprehended and brutally killed by the nazis.

p As many as 231 partisan groups were active in Byelorussia by August i, 1941, with another 437 forming before autumn was over.  [203•2 

p At the end of June 1941, the partisans mounted active operations. In July-August they became a mighty force threatening the enemy. M. F. Shmyryov’s unit alone performed 27 successful combat missions in August-September, forcing the nazis to put up signs "Partizan zone" in its area of operations.  [203•3 

p Gradually, the partisan movement gained experience and developed specific forms of combat. Partisans raided enemy garrisons and ambushed nazi troops on the march, attacked personnel and destroyed weapons, cut highways, and blew up bridges and troop trains, conducting an eminently 204 successful "rail war”. Clinging for months to cleared territory,, the partisans wiped out fascist occupation administrations^ paralysed the enemy rear and frustrated many an economic and political undertaking of the nazi authorities. Scouts were trained, who supplied valuable information to the Red Army Command.

p To be sure, mistakes were made, too, in the early months of the partisan war due to inexperience and ignorance of the specifics of guerrilla warfare. Some units were overcautious, slow to unfold combat operations, while others rushed headlong against superior forces. Gradually the commanders learned that skilful well-timed moves were the key to success in their kind of war. One after the other, the groups performed daring long-distance raids across enemy-occupied territory, keeping constantly on the move. A fortnight’s raid was made in September 1941 by S. P. Osechkin’s Ukrainian detachment, and another unit, under I. F. Borovik, operated successfully near Kiev, then left the Malin forest in October 1941 and, after a Goo-kilometre trek, established itself in the Bryansk forests. 1.1. Kopeikin’s detachment drove deep into the enemy rear, raiding town and village garrisons. S. A. Kovpak’s operations were extraordinarily audacious. Joining forces with A. N. Saburov, he conducted a 7oo-kilometre raid from the Bryansk forests to the Ukraine west of the Dnieper in October and November 1942.

p Facts and figures show the scale on which the partisans operated. In the first five months of the war Byelorussian partisans derailed as many as 597 troop trains, blew up or set fire to 473 railway and road bridges, destroyed 855 motor vehicles, 24 panzers and armoured cars, killing more than 2,220 German soldiers, officers and policemen.  [204•1 

p In the cities, too, partisans performed spectacular operations. City combat techniques were developed. In Minsk, for example, through the period of its occupation, partisans killed more than 1,600 military and civil officials,  [204•2  among whom was Wilhelm Kube, Hitler’s gauleiter in Byelorussia. He was executed by a girl partisan, Y. G. Mazanik, who was helped in the bold operation by other girl heroes—M. B. Osipova, N. V. Troyan and N. N. Drozd.

205

p Partisan co-operation with the Red Army was close. While General P. A. Belov’s troops penetrated behind enemy lines towards the town of Vyazma at the end of January 1942, partisans captured Dorogobuzh, and throughout the Soviet counter-offensive at Moscow partisans hit the enemy from the rear, cutting his communications and supplying invaluable intelligence. The Red Army reciprocated, staging attacks to take the heat off the partisans and compelling the nazi command to fold up punitive operations.

p Measuring the magnitude of the partisan operations, we should bear in mind the enemy strength this drew off from the battle-lines. In the summer and autumn of 1942, for example, as many as 22-24 nazi divisions were kept in the rear as protection,  [205•1  and immediately behind the front-line troops, too, special units were held ready to repulse partisan attacks.

p The mushrooming movement needed unified control to be more effective. That is why on May 30, 1942, a Central Partisan Headquarters was set up under the Supreme Command. Regional headquarters were also formed—for the Ukraine, the Bryansk area, the Western area, Kalinin Region, Leningrad Region and the Karelo-Finnish sector. These helped the movement grow and coordinated its operations with the Red Army. Through them, too, the nation extended every possible aid to the armed struggle behind the enemy lines.

p The German Command was frantic. On July 25, 1941, a little over a month after the outbreak of the war, the nazis issued a special order, following up with a more specific directive on October 25, 1941. German troops were instructed to unleash wholesale terrorism against partisans and the civilian population. The later directive qualified the entire population as responsible for every act of resistance. The inhuman system of hostages was introduced, and all " suspects" were executed out of hand. On November n, 1942, General-Fieldmarshal Wilhelm Keitel endorsed the Instructions on Combating Partisans in the East, drawn up by General Alfred Jodl. Voicing alarm over the possible effects of partisan activity on army morale, the instructions called for high-powered punitive measures.

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p But the more brutally the occupation forces behaved, the more rapidly the partisan movement grew. The people’s avengers, as Soviet people began to call the partisans, were a terror for the invaders. General Guderian deplored that "the guerrilla war became a veritable plague, which also affected the morale of the men at the front".  [206•1  Werner Picht, a West German militarist ideologist, amplified: "The greater the space that the soldiers seized, the more of a hell that space became for them."  [206•2 

p Tens of thousands of more people joined in. In the first four months of 1943 partisan numbers in the Ukraine increased more than two’and a half times.  [206•3  As many as 512 units totalling 57,700 men were active in Byelorussia in January 1943, and by November the number went up to 720 with 122,600 men.  [206•4  Partisan strength in Leningrad Region increased mdre than 10-fold in 1943-  [206•5  Ties with the local population grew stronger and civilian support expanded.

p Partisans were conscious of their internationalist duty and accepted people of other nationalities. In late autumn 1941 Fritz Schmenkel, corporal in the nazi army, left his unit and joined the Soviet partisan detachment, "Death to Fascism”, operating in Smolensk Region. He fought for the Soviet Union and his own homeland. In the spring of 1943 a Polish partisan unit was formed in Zhitomir and Rovno regions, later growing into a large formation. In September 1943 a Polish partisan unit known as Wanda Wasilewska Brigade was activated as part of the Chernigov-Volyn partisan force.

p Slovak soldiers and officers going over to the partisans formed a large unit under Jan Nalepka in May 1943. In November it participated in the fighting for the town of Ovruch, attacked jointly by Soviet troops and the partisan force. Nalepka died a hero’s death in that battle and was bestowed the title of Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously.

p Powerful partisan forces grew out of the earlier detachments. Some Ukrainian groups, for example, consisted of 3,000 men each by the spring of 1943: the Zhitomir force under A. N. Saburov and Z. A. Bogatyr, the Kholmy force 207 under N. N. Popudrenko and S. M. Novikov, the " Motherland" force in Chernigov Region and another under N. N. Taranushchenko and K. A. Taranyuk.

p With war production expanding steadily, the flow of supplies to the partisans—chiefly armaments, ammunition, explosives and communications facilities —increased. Regular radio and air communications, even with transport planes landing in partisan areas, were maintained in many places.

p The nature of the operations behind enemy lines changed too. Raids featured more prominently. A partisan cavalry detachment in the Ukraine under M. I. Naumov and I. Ye. Anisimenko roamed across enemy-occupied territory a distance of 2,000 kilometres in the winter of 1943 and was the first to cross into the Southern Ukraine. The Sumy partisan force drove farther still—all the way to the Carpathian foothills, its route totalling nearly 2,000 km. And a longdistance raid by the Byelostock partisan force was also highly successful.

p As before, the partisans avoided full-scale battles with large enemy forces. They repulsed the attacks of punitive troops, then disengaged themselves.

p In December 1942 and January 1943 the German Command mounted a large punitive operation in Smolensk Region. Its effort proved futile. Inflicting heavy losses, the partisans moved out of reach, pitching new camps and retaining control of the Kletnya woods. In January-March 1943 the nazis went out against partisans in Kalinin Region and various parts of Byelorussia. The partisans were compelled to fight a large-scale action against superior enemy forces. The Central Partisan Headquarters concerted the operation of all partisan forces in the area, defeating the nazis. Another large-scale nazi operation, mounted from Osveya District in Byelorussia against local and Latvian partisans, was also abortive. Kalinin, Byelorussian and Latvian partisans operated jointly on orders from Central Headquarters under a unified local command. While the main force took up defensive positions! the Latvian detachment under V. P. Samson struck against the rear of the punitive troops, and at the junction of the three Soviet Republics a ^<fmound of friendship" was erected after the war in tribute to the comradeship and unity of the Russian, Byelorussian and Latvian partisans.

p One of the biggest of Hitler’s operations against partisans was mounted in Western Byelorussia in the beginning of 208 July 1943 by 50,000 men under police Major-General von Gottberg. After 35 days of heavy fighting the punitive force was compelled to withdraw from the Ivenets-Naliboki Forest, the main partisan base.

p In the second stage of the partisan movement actions against enemy communication lines, especially the railways, assumed even greater proportions. The "rail war" developed into simultaneous attacks on railways over large areas in the enemy rear. The first concentrated blow was struck in July-August 1943. In a few days tracks at more than 133,000 points were demolished, totalling some 800 km in length.  [208•1  The second similar operation, under the code name Concert,’ was performed in the latter half of September 1943.

p Attacks on communication lines were timed to coincide with Soviet Army operations. Besides, partisan units helped the regular troops in river crossings. During the battle for the Dnieper, the partisans built 25 pontoon bridges for the Red Army and participated in liberating towns and fortified enemy zones (Rechitsa, Yelsk, Cherkassy, Znamenka, etc.). In some cases, the partisans liberated and held towns, district centres and villages (Novoshepelichi, Ovruch, Narovlya, etc.) on their own, clearing the path for the Red Army. When regular troops came to large partisan zones, the coordination became closer and still more effective.

p Partisans accumulated valuable combat experience, producing knowledgeable and capable commanders and fearless guerrillas. They amounted complicated operations, growing into a factor of strategic magnitude, which the Soviet Supreme Command included in its operational planning.

p Unable to wipe out the partisan movement, the nazis vented their fury on captured partisans. They brutally killed the heavily wounded M. I. Guryanov, Komsomols Shura Chekalin, Liza Chaikina, and thousands of others. Yet nothing could break the will of the people’s avengers or their faith in final victory.

p When the last of the invaders were being driven out of Soviet territory, the partisans hit out against them effectively. The large army of Byelorussian partisans took a most active part in the final battles in Byelorussia. Three days before the Red Army began its Byelorussian Operation the partisans accomplished one of the most powerful actions of the "rail 209 war”, blowing up the tracks at more than 40,000 points in one night, thus paralysing enemy communications. The German Command was in distress, unable swiftly to regroup forces and bring up reserves. The partisans ruled large areas and controlled the roads, showing Soviet troops the way to the enemy rear and helping them surround large nazi formations.

p Fraternal Soviet partisan aid to friends in the occupied countries expanded.

p Many thousands. of Soviet people whom the war had displaced, participated in the armed struggle of the peoples in the overrun countries. Most of them were soldiers and officers escaped from German concentration camps. Far away from their homeland, they saw their duty in fighting the common enemy. Their courage won them affection and respect in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, France, Belgium, Italy, Norway and other countries.

p The first Soviet partisan detachments on Polish soil comprised men and women who had escaped from nazi captivity. One unit was named Chapayev Detachment, and others bore the names Victory, Shchors, For Freedom, Kotovsky. They co-operated closely with Polish partisans and the Gwardia Ludowa, their help to the latter in repulsing German punitive forces in the Parczew woods being a model of co-operation. With superior numbers and armed to the teeth, the invaders were forced to flee.

p In due course partisan units, earlier active in nazi-occupied Soviet territory, extended their operations to the neighbouring East and Southeast European countries. Fighting shoulder to shoulder with Polish, Czechoslovak and other patriots, they participated in liberating those countries.

p More than 80 Soviet partisan units fought jointly with the Polish partisans in Poland, the joint actions increasing in scale since the spring of 1944, when the First Ukrainian partisan Division under P. P. Vershigora and the partisan detachments and units of I. N. Banov, V. P. Chepiga, V. A. Karasyov, G. V. Kovalyov, M. Ya. Nedelin, V. P. Polikh, N. A. Prokopyuk, S. A. Sankov, B. G. Shangin and I. P. Yakovlev crossed the border into Polish territory along a wide frontage.

p In July-August 1944 some Soviet partisan units crossed from Eastern and Southern Poland into Slovakia, including the brigade of V. A. Karasyov, the detachments of M. M. 14 210 Shukayev and V. A. Kvitinsky and the units of S. V. Mantsev arid Kurov, and the Pozharsky unit. Besides, 24 organiser groups were parachuted into Slovakia by Soviet planes.  [210•1  These grew into large Slovak partisan formations. Captain A, S. Yegorov’s group, for example, comprising but 22 men when it landed, was 850 strong a week later and then swelled into a force of 5,000 men of 22 nationalities.  [210•2 

p The Soviet partisans actively participated in the Slovak popular uprising—one of the most heroic and glorious chapters of the patriotic struggle in Czechoslovakia.

p By mid-1944 as many as 32 Soviet partisan units totalling 1,440 men operated in France. Besides, according to incomplete estimates, another 900 Soviet citizens were members of French partisan units.  [210•3  "The blood of the Soviet partisans that fell on French soil,” wrote G. Laroche, a leader of the French Resistance, "is the purest and most enduring cement that has joined the French and Russian peoples in friendship for all time."  [210•4 

p Several partisan units consisting of Soviet citizens operated in Belgium. The biggest of these was known as the Homeland Brigade.

p Soviet people were also active in the Italian partisan movement. According to Italian historian Roberto Battaglia, "former Soviet POWs, from the unknown soldiers who gave the signal for the rising in Santa-Maria Capua Vetere and fell in battle, to the better-known men who will be well remembered, joined the partisan movement without hesi- tation".  [210•5  According to a modest estimate at least 2,000 Soviet citizens fought along with the Italian partisans,  [210•6  the number increasing steeply during the April 1945 rising. The Russian battalion covered itself with glory in the Emilia fighting.

p Fyodor Poletayev, a collective-farm blacksmith from Ryazan Region, became Italy’s national hero. An official partisan document described him thus: "He was as huge 211 as an oak, kind and brave, like a true Hercules. He was the best among us."  [211•1  The inscription on the tombstone of Nikolai Buyanov, another partisan hero, erected by the Italian people on the place where he was killed, says, "Freedom knows no borders."  [211•2 

p Among the mass graves in the Ardeative Caves, sarcophagus No. 329 bears the name, "Kulishkin Alexei”. But the Russian sailor, who had served on the destroyer Silny, and who took part in the Italian partisan movement—his name was really Alexei Afanasyevich Kubyshkin—had not been shot by the hitlerites as his Italian friends thought (failing to find his body, they put the sarcophagus symbolically) and now resides in Beryozovsk near Sverdlovsk.  [211•3 

p The heroism of the Soviet Army and partisans was an example for the entire Resistance Movement.

In the Great Patriotic War Soviet partisans killed, wounded or captured 1,500,000 nazi soldiers, occupation officials and collaborationists, and derailed more than 18,000 troop trains.  [211•4  Not measurable in figures was the moral damage to the nazi army and the uplift and encouragement to people in enemy-occupied territory.