Product Description

As a teenager in Nazi-occupied Ukraine the author had one aim in his life, "I had a dream: to survive until our guys got back, become a soldier myself, get a submachine gun, and head westward with them. Our forces weren't moving westward, however. They were still busy retreating, somewhere there, on the Volga, in the Caucasus. It was a vague promise I had made to myself to 'sometime, someday'. . . ." Written as a journal of his experiences while a teenager during the German occupation and later, as a memoir of his Red Army service, Victims, Victors describes the confusion and agony of the conquered, and, ultimately, the triumph over those who invaded his homeland and murdered its citizens. Victims, Victors is, however, much more than a common chronicle of wartime experiences. Victims, Victors provides inside detail and views that could not be found in Russian books printed during the Soviet era.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #334283 in Books
• Published on: 2007-04-01
• Released on: 2007-04-10
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 312 pages

Review
A remarkable document, casting light on events little understood. . . . Required reading for students of World War II and modern Russian history. --Journal of Military History

In terms of its breadth, perspective, and candor, Kravchenko's memoir is truly unique. --David M. Glantz, from the foreword

About the Author
Roman Kravchenko-Berezhnoy was born in 1926 in Poland. His family was Russian, his father a former Tsarist officer. His town was incorporated into the Soviet Union in 1939, and in 1941 it was made part of German-occupied Ukraine. After having experienced and documented the Nazi occupation, the author joined the Red Army in the spring of 1944, where he at first served as a simple rifleman (with a submachine gun) in the 61st Army s 356th Rifle Division. When his language skills were noticed he was transferred to a reconnaissance detachment in the same division. He fought in Latvia, Poland, and Germany up to the seizure of Berlin. In occupied Germany he served as a military interpreter for about five years, including an Inter-Allied group searching for the remains of Allied aviators. Because of the nature of the Stalinist system he was then rewarded for his long service abroad and contacts with westerners with banishment to a construction battalion in the Motherland. This was a penalty, but thanks to it he could graduate his secondary education. After almost 7 years of service in the enlisted ranks of the Red Army, he entered Lvov University in 1950. After graduation in 1955 from Lvov University, for more than fifty years Kravchenko-Berezhnoy has lived in the extreme north of Russia with his wife, Lyudmila Ivanovna. Both physicists, they met in 1957 as colleagues, married in 1963, and both received their PhDs for research work at the Kola Centre of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Their daughter, Natalia, has a PhD in medicine, and their son, Vasily, is a Doctor in physics and mathematics. They have two grandchildren. Roman s elder son, Igor, has a PhD in geology and is also an expert in translation of scientific literature to English. Roman, now 80, still works at his institute in Apatity, Kola Peninsula, Russia.

Customer Reviews

Must have!

No matter how many times I think I've read it all when it comes to the Eastern Front of the Second World War, there comes a book which again proves to me that there is always something new to discover. In the end this book is much more than a simple memoir about the Eastern Front.

The author was under German occupation in his hometown of Kremenets, which had been in an area that before WWI belonged to Russia, then after the Russian Civil War and all the border changes became a part of Poland. In 1939 after Poland was invaded, conquered, and split up amongst the USSR and Germany, it became a part of the Soviet Union, then when Germany invaded it became part of German-controlled Ukraine. After WWII it returned again to the Soviet Union and after the breakup of the USSR it became a part of Ukraine. This long and winding process of moving borders sets the stage for the authors impressions during the occupation period by both the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany.

The author's father was in the Russian Army during the First World War and finished it as a Captain. He was very proud of his services to Russia and was even a recipient of the Cross of St. George as well as the Order of St. Anne with Swords. This would eventually get him in trouble with Soviet authorities when Poland was invaded in September of 1939. The reason this book presents such a surprising read is because the author kept a diary during his occupation years. For around three years whatever he witnessed he wrote down, in between these entries the author also puts in other snapshots, as he calls them, of memory that fill in the picture further with events that he might not have deemed important to write in his diary or information he feared might implicate others if his diary was ever found.

The reader is presented with the author's traumatic experiences with Poles before the war began: he was abused because he was a Russian living in Poland. Then when the Soviets came his father was taken away to prison because of his past. Later still his father returned and the Soviets had to retreat as the Germans invaded the Soviet Union. It is this event that the majority of the book is based on. Kremenets is situated in Western Ukraine which means within its population you can find Ukrainians, Poles, Russians, and Jews amongst others. Throughout the occupation the reader will be interested to find out how these various peoples responded to the Germans and their occupational policies. But aside from the different nationalities there were also different political motivations and of course religion as always played a large role.

The author tragically recounts his last view of a Jewish girl whom he befriended and developed feelings for as she was taken away in a truck to be executed. Another girl who he was friends with was killed during the first few days of the German invasion of Poland during a bombing. Partisans run wild in the countryside and villages are burned to the ground on a daily basis as retaliation. What started off as accounts told again and again about these acts turns to a mundane acceptance of the fact that people are dying and their homes are being systematically destroyed. The Jews of Kremenets numbering around 10,000 were massacred and aside from some what might think, the town knew all of what was happening. Burglars ran into the now empty ghetto that had been set up for the Jews and looted what they could, inadvertently causing fires to spread throughout the ghetto because they had to use candles to see in the dark when robbing the dead.

The author explains how he used to listen to the radio and write down in shorthand all the information he could so as to know where the front was moving and what was going on in other parts of the world. Rumors were spreading through the town (marked by the phrase 'they say that'), some accurate, others false. He had a few encounters with the Germans throughout the occupation but none turned violent or deadly. In the end, after liberation, he decided to enlist in the Red Army. To a large degree he wanted to make his father proud and he wanted to make a contribution and prove his worth to his land and people.
The author's career in the army isn't as well documented and covered because he did not keep a diary since it wasn't allowed nor did he have time to write one. Despite this a few interesting episodes are recounted and make for interesting reading.

One episode which stood out to me was how he mentions that the Red Army fought to liberate territory, not occupy it. Specifically on page 213:
"I will never again be in those parts and visit those graves [speaking of Latvia and those who Red Army men who died there]: I'm not that strong anymore. State borders separate us now, with all the different visas and invitations required. Why will invite me there since the latvians now see Soviets as 'occupiers'? I thought we were the liberators. Those, resting in the mass graves, who are they?"
I don't think I could have said it any better, these men did not fight to occupy and enslave, they fought to free and liberate!

As much as some like to think that the Red Army was a barbaric 'horde' encouraged from Moscow to plunder and rape the Germans, that popular image does not match with the author's experience. The author did see Soviet vandalism but also witnessed an execution of a Red Army man charged with looting. He also describes how he translated for a German woman who stated that she had been gang raped. The author is certain that she indeed was raped by soldiers of his own army, but he cannot testify about a rape spree. He does not dispute such a spree outright. He simply can't provide any personal evidence to support that image.

As with other incidents like looting, rapes occurred sporadically and at an individual's initiative, not as part of any Red Army policy. One has to keep in mind that war is war and no one involved in a war comes out with clean hands. While this doesn't justify what the Red Army did, and nothing should, it does put it into perspective and into context. One should recall that everyone was drafted, from the boys that just turned 17 to hardened criminals who were being given a second chance.

There are many more stories and episodes which are related in the book and that will hold the reader's imagination and attention for a long time to come. As I mentioned, having read a great deal of literature on this time period and event I was surprised to see information here that I knew little to nothing about and for that I thank the author. It is a great addition to the literature on both the Holocaust and the war on the Eastern Front.

One of the Essentials of Eastern Front Military History!
Victims, Victors clearly fills a gaping chasm in the history of the Eastern Front by offering us the perspective of a young Russian boy who survives German occupation and later becomes a decorated Red Army infantryman. The historiographical record of Red Army soldier memoirs in English is truly sparse; in fact, I can count on one hand how many I have read. Although those previous accounts have been critical in their own right, Roman Kravchenko's personal odyssey is both unique and compelling because it chronicles the psychological angst of a young man who must first live among his enemy (the German Army) before taking up arms to fight that very same nemesis and push him back to his own borders. The immediacy and accuracy of Kravchenko's narrative resonates deeply because he bases much of it on a secret diary he kept during the German occupation -- a document that later became a piece of evidence during the post-war Nuremburg trials. Mixing both diary entries and memory, Kravchenko takes us on a physical and psychological journey of life on the Eastern Front and reveals to us the emotions, feelings, and hopes of the average Russian who is thrust into extraordinary circumstances and must find ways to survive and bear witness to the horrors of war. Kravchenko's account is a primary-source document of the highest caliber that strips away some of the mythos surrounding the Red Army and its soldiers. He gives life and dimension to characters like his company's senior sergeant, the starshina, who mentors the awkward youngster and in turn reflects a level of soldierly professionalism that easily matches that of the German, British, or American armies of the time. No more do we see mindless Russian hordes who nihilistically throw themselves into the Wehrmacht's meat grinder time after time. We see fellow human beings who value life, who see life's potential, and who want to live to fulfill their own dreams and aspirations. The sensitive and insightful Kravchenko is therefore the Red Army's best chronicler of these important facts, and his book stands as an important addition to the continued study of the Eastern Front and the clash of titans that occurred in that bloody part of the world from 1941 to 1945. True historians of World War II cannot fail to include this critical book in their libraries of 'must-have' tomes.

important warhistory

This book represents a very important contribution to the literature of World War II in several ways. Kravchenko's use of both a diary and his memories gives us a unique picture of a teenager experiences with the cruelty of war. He describes to us the life in Kremenets during the German occupation but manages also to describe and give a comment on the war on the Eastern front. We also get valuable information on the treatment of Soviet Prisoners of War, the mobilization of the Forced workers from Ukraine to Germany and the partisan movement. The book is in addition to this a very good source to the history of the Red Army and its soldiers.

The killing and deportation of the Jews of Kremenets is a history of horror and human suffering. Kravchenko writes that he feels awful and ashamed when his Jewish friend Frida is taken away to the prison by the Germans in august 1942. He describes how she is standing on the truck, proudly with her head held high. This occurrence gives us a brief insight in the strong emotions connected to a meaningless loss of a good friend. Kravchenko gives us a very close description of frightful experiences according to the massacre of the Jews of Kremenets. Being an eye-witness to the Germans brutal conduct in Kremenets the diary represents so much more than a ordinary journal of wartime experiences.

Kravchenko's years as a sergeant in post-war Germany provides the reader a different picture on how the Red Army soldiers behaved when they got to Germany. He writes that he never came across or even heard of any orders in the red Army to sack cities and to rape. Nor did he see evidence of Soviet atrocities of the scale suggested by other writers. This simply does not match with his personal experiences as a soldier in the Red Army.

"Victims, Victors: From Nazi Occupation to the Conquest of Germany as seen by a Red Army Soldier" reveals the human suffering during World War II on the Eastern front and it represent a necessary contribution to military history. This is a very important book for those who seek knowledge about and understanding of the Soviet struggle against the German occupiers.