Forced Labor of Germans in The Soviet Union | Forced Labor Germans Soviet Union

Forced labor of Germans in the Soviet Union was considered by the Soviet Union to be part of German war reparations for the damage inflicted by Nazi Germany on the Soviet Union during World War II. German civilians in Eastern Europe were deported to the USSR after World War II as forced laborers. Ethnic Germans living in the USSR were deported during World War II and conscripted for forced labor. German prisoners of war were also used as a source of forced labor during and after the war by the Soviet Union and the Western Allies.

The use of German labor as reparations was proposed by the Soviet government starting in 1943, and the issue was raised at the Yalta Conference by the Soviets. The USSR began deporting ethnic Germans from the Balkans in late 1944, most the surviving internees had returned by 1950. The NKVD took the lead role in it via its department, Chief Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees' Affairs (Главное управление по делам военнопленных и интернированных, ГУПВИ, transliterated as GUPVI).

Information about this was suppressed in the Eastern Bloc until the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Before that, however, it was known in the West through accounts released in West Germany and recollections of the internees. These German accounts are cited by historians that cover the employment of German labor by the USSR.

Famous quotes containing the words soviet union, forced, labor, germans, soviet and/or union:

“There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration.... The United States does not concede that those countries are under the domination of the Soviet Union.”
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)

“Only the other day I was inquiring of an entire bed of old- fashioned roses, forced to listen to my ramblings on the meaning of the universe as I sat cross-legged in the lotus position in front of them.”
—Prince Charles (b. 1948)

“It is queer to contemplate how many people there are in any community who labor under the hallucination that if one is engaged in any occupation different from their own, that they are just having a good time, with no possible hardships to encounter.”
—Caroline Nichols Churchill (1833–?)

“Biography, too, is liable to the same objection; it should be autobiography. Let us not, as the Germans advise, endeavor to go abroad and vex our bowels that we may be somebody else to explain him. If I am not I, who will be?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

“If the Soviet Union let another political party come into existence, they would still be a one-party state, because everybody would join the other party.”
—Ronald Reagan (b. 1911)

“The best philosophical attitude to adopt towards the world is a union of the sarcasm of gaiety with the indulgence of contempt.”
—Sébastien-Roch Nicolas De Chamfort (1741–1794)