In the Great Patriotic War, the Soviet Union raised the strength of the whole country, paid nearly 27 million military and civilian casualties, and emerged many heroes who can sing and cry.
The one I'm going to talk about today, her name is Zoya Kosmojeyanskaya, and there is a German army because of her, on the blacklist of Stalin and the Soviet army.
As we all know, it is the consensus of all countries in the world that prisoners must not be killed on the battlefield. However, in the Soviet-German War, Germany and the Soviet Union were extremely red-eyed due to differences in racial concepts and ideologies, and the two armies met each other on the battlefield. Many codes of war and international conventions no longer exist in this war.
It was a deadly battle between the two countries, and throughout the war, millions of soldiers on both sides of the Soviet union became prisoners of the other side, many of whom were tortured, and only a few could return home alive; and there was a German army that did not even enjoy the treatment of entering a prisoner-of-war camp, and the only treatment they could enjoy was annihilation on the spot.
What's going on? Let's review from the beginning -
On June 22, 1941, Germany raided the Soviet Union.
Many enthusiastic young people, both men and women, under the call of the motherland, resolutely rushed to the front line and joined the war of defending the country.
Zoya, who was only 18 years old, said to her mother: "Mom, I am going to go to the guerrilla war, you know, when the fascists rush to Moscow, we cannot stand idly by." ”
In October 1941, Zoya and her comrades infiltrated behind enemy lines, in the village of Petrisevo, west of Moscow, where they planned to burn the German stables. Due to the betrayal of the traitors, Zoya was unfortunately arrested by the Germans.
The unit that arrested Zoya was the 332nd Regiment of the 197th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht. Formed in January 1940, the 197th Division was a unit known for its brutality, consisting of: the 321st Infantry Regiment, the 332nd Regiment, the 347th Regiment, the 229th Artillery Regiment, the 229th Reconnaissance Battalion, the 229th Anti-Tank Battalion, the 229th Engineering Battalion, and the 229th Communications Battalion.
After the invasion of the Soviet Union, the division participated in the Battle of Minsk and had been participating in the German Army Group Center, and during the Soviet-German War, a total of 12 men in the division were awarded the Knight's Cross, including Lieutenant Colonel Ludrell, Zoya's killer.
The captured Zoya was indomitable and refused to confess.
The enemy tortured her in every way, whipping her with a leather whip, burning her face with matches, making her walk barefoot in the snow every hour, and so on. Zoya was tortured, but none of this made Zoya give in, and she never revealed any secrets of her side.
On 29 November, enraged soldiers of the German 322nd Regiment pulled Zoya to the gallows in the name of an arsonist.
Zoya shouted to the German soldiers: "You can hang me, but I am not alone, they have twenty thousand people, they will avenge me, victory belongs to us!" ”
Then he turned to the villagers and said, "Farewell, comrades!" Don't be afraid, die for your own people, it is happy! ”
After the heroic righteousness, Zoya's body was hung on the gallows for a month, and that Christmas, the beastly Germans insulted Zoya's body and cruelly cut off her breasts.
In order to leave no evidence, the Germans erased all traces of the torture and killing of Zoya.
But the story quickly spread throughout the Soviet Union, and Zoya became a hero for all of the Soviet Union.
Stalin, after hearing of Zoya's heroic deeds, was extremely saddened, and the father, who did not want to exchange his son for a German marshal, immediately gave instructions to the Soviet Western Front:
"Any officer or soldier who encounters the 332nd Regiment of the German 197th Infantry Division on the battlefield must be shot on the spot and will never accept their surrender."
In the ensuing great counteroffensive of the Moscow Defense War, the entire Soviet army fought against the enemy and shouted slogans from the original "defend the Soviets, defend Stalin" to "avenge Zoya"!
By July 1944, the Germans were getting thinner and thinner, and the Soviets had begun a full-scale counteroffensive.
In the Battle of Belorussia, a German army was surrounded by Soviet troops, and in the face of running out of ammunition, they begged the Soviets to surrender. One unit of the besieged German army was the 332nd Regiment of the 197th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht.
Zhukov reported the situation to Stalin.
When Stalin learned of the situation, he angrily slapped the table and said: "Any other German army unit is allowed to surrender, but this one, unforgivable, they killed our hero Zoya!" ”
One sentence determined the fate of that unit, and the 332nd Regiment was then completely annihilated, becoming the only unit in the Soviet-German war to surrender and was refused.
The hero of the Soviet Union, Zoya, whose statue is still erected on the moscow square.