THE KRASNOVS IN WORLD WAR II
Few years passed and in 1939 the fire of World War
II began again in Europe. This one indisputably surpassed
the first one, not only because of its magnitude but also for
the seriousness of the mistakes made by the leaders of each
of the belligerent parties.
In 1942, Germany, who had remained triumphant
until that moment, broke its ephemeral pact with Stalin
and invaded the Soviet Union. Here we will not refer to the
course that the war took because it is not our topic. We are
only interested in pointing out one particular and important
fact: the German troops opened the doors of the Soviet
Union which had been hermetically closed until then.
Immediately, both the Cossacks from the inside and
the outside began to mobilize. Those who lived in Russia
still resisted the Soviet forces as guerrillas hidden in forests.
The support of the German troops and their armaments
reactivated their resistance against the Communist
government, and groups of volunteer soldiers who were
ready to fight appeared everywhere.
In Europe there was great commotion among
Russian immigrants: the German aggression might be the
end of the Communist government; then, who could remain
indifferent toward the hope that surged for those in exile?
General Krasnov did not doubt. His role consisted
not only in motivating his young fellow-citizens to go and
fight for the freedom of Russia. He, who was already 74,
and his son, Simon, set out too. But they were not the only
soldiers of the family. A nephew and a young great-nephew
accompanied them: they were Officers Nicholas Krasnov
and his son who carried the same name as his father.
The arrival of the legendary Ataman raised a delirious
enthusiasm among the Cossacks. As a mythical figure, the
hero of so many battles, who at his age didn’t hesitate in
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taking arms again, was coming back. For his people this was
a symbol of his best virtues.
Anyhow, we must say, so our story can be objective,
that the volunteer Cossacks would find more obstacles than
support from the Germans. Hitler’s obsession of absolutely
imposing the supposed superiority of the German race
made him resist accepting the participation of these
volunteers without subjecting them, in everything, to the
German discipline and chiefs.
Nevertheless, the Cossacks did not want to fight
for the Germans and, in fact, they never accepted to wear
the German uniform. They did want to continue the
uninterrupted fight for the freedom of their country and they
demanded to do it their way: with their sotnias (regiments),
with their chiefs, their uniforms, and their glorious flags.
If the Fuehrer had understood this, not only would
the Cossacks have achieved more triumphs, but also they
probably would have conquered the freedom of the Russian
people who had already been oppressed by Stalin’s brutal
tyranny. All was lost due to the racist policy imposed by
Hitler; instead of appearing as a liberator, he enslaved them
using them as untermenschen (sub-men) at the service of
the Germans, übermenschen (super-men). Placed like this,
between two tyrannies, the Russian people turned towards
the tyrant who was their same race and blood, and they
supported Stalin until they defeated Germany.
Turning back to the Cossacks’ experience, precious
month’s time was lost in discussions, transactions and
details while they combated in dispersed groups or in small
units that decreased the effectiveness of their heroism.
Fortunately a great man appeared. He understood
them and –although he was a high-ranking officer of the
German army– was able to identify with them and defend
their aspirations that were only fair. This man was Marshal
Helmut von Pannwitz.
46
Elderly General Krasnov and General Von Pannwitz, during World War II.
Of noble origin, born in High Silesia, not far from
the frontiers of the Russian Empire, which included part
of Poland in those times, young Helmut met the Cossacks
who served at the frontier. Having a fine and receptive
spirit, he perceived the human values that lay behind the
coarse simplicity of these men, and he didn’t forget them.
After a brilliant military career, promoted to the rank
of major general, his life crossed with the Cossacks again at
war. Understanding their mentality and speaking perfect
Russian, it was not difficult for him to obtain the position of
commander of the Cossack units, which were coordinated
under his command. That is how the 1st Cossack Division
was born in 1943.
Von Pannwitz not only was a great officer. As a man
endowed with true moral greatness, he soon became the
Cossack’s idol for by virtue of his rectitude and patriotism.
The hard military life, the triumphs and defeats, and the
humane treatment that he always gave them, brought them
closer in mutual admiration. Belonging to the Lutheran
religion, the general never kept from participating with
deep respect with his soldiers in the ceremonies of the
Orthodox liturgy that the Cossack military chaplains
celebrated. From his few German soldiers he demanded
understanding and respect in their treatment towards the
Cossacks. If any of them showed disrespect or contempt
towards them, he would dismiss him and he would be sent
to another military unit.
Towards the end of the war, the delegates of all the
Cossack bodies of cavalry, decided to express their adhesion
to the commander. The maximum title was bestowed upon
him: that of Feldataman, this is, ataman of atamans6, supreme
function which had been reserved for the czarevitch and
was vacant since the death of Alexis, the son of Nicholas
II, czar of Russia who was killed by the communists along
with his entire family.
6
Francois de Lannoy, Les cosaques de Pannwitz, Ed. Heimdal, Bayeux,
2000.
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But, meanwhile, the German forces began to come
back from the bottom of the impenetrable Russian winter.
Little hope was left. The Cossacks had to follow the Germans
in their retreat and many of them, understanding that
Communism would be strengthened by the war, decided
to emigrate definitely and seek other lands that would let
them keep their traditions and customs. This is how entire
families with their wives, their children, their elders, and
few goods followed the soldiers.
The 1st Cossack Division was destined by the High
Command to fight in Yugoslavia, where Tito’s guerrillas
had cut communications and controlled entire regions.
But it was necessary to explain this new destination to
the Cossacks. For this, Von Pannwitz appealed to Ataman
Krasnov and asked him to speak to the troops personally,
showing them the need to fight in strange lands. Many
German generals doubted about the combativeness of
these men being far from their ancestral lands. However,
the Cossacks responded with absolute generosity.
They fought with their usual fierceness, and in
little time they paralyzed the drive of Tito’s guerrillas and
maintained control over the territories which they were
entrusted to recover.
At the end of 1944, the Cossacks had to face a different
and more powerful enemy. In their unstoppable advance
towards the West, the Soviet troops entered Yugoslavia and
shook hands with Tito’s communists. The “Stalin” infantry
division was able to establish a solid bridgehead on the left
bank of Drave River.
German and Croatian units were sent with the
mission of dislodging the Reds but were rejected and
failed in their attempt. Then this mission was entrusted
to the Kuban, the Terek and the Don Cossacks under the
command of Colonel Kononov.
The Cossacks began the attack with vigor, but they
were stopped by the Soviet’s powerful artillery. Then, a
group of them, under the command of Captain Orlov, in
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an audacious and almost suicidal stratagem, infiltrated
behind the soviet troops, broke into the middle of them, and
completely destroyed the enemy artillery. Simultaneously,
Kononov, fronting the Cossacks of Don, made a frontal
attack supported by the Terek and Kuban Cossacks. The
Stalin division was surrounded and its panic-stricken men
retreated and were put to rout. It was a crushing victory:
the Russians lost hundreds of men; many of them drowned
in the Drave River, while the Cossacks took many more
as prisoners who were bewildered by the fact that their
defeaters were not Germans but Cossacks.
“It was a resounding victory –writes a German
officer. It meant that the Soviets retreated to the North
with their troops, and it proved that the Cossacks –to fight
against Communism– were willing to fight even against
the Red Army.”7
But let us go back to the main story which is the
final destination for those who we are interested in here.
Throughout the war, Simon Krasnov, who served Von
Pannwitz’s orders justly, had been decorated by the
Germans three times for his outstanding performance in
combat. He achieved the degree of Major General and, in
this condition, he sent the troops that were destined to the
battlefront in Italy towards the end of the war.8
Later on, in 1944, during a pause in his military
responsibilities, he married Dhyna Martchenko, a beautiful
Cossack from Kuban, a university student residing in
Paris. Dhyna had received meticulous education from her
parents, in order to prepare her for the difficult life of the
expatriated Russians. She was a translator and interpreter
and spoke five or six languages correctly.
Meanwhile, the war followed its inexorable course.
The region of the Italian Alps was dominated by the
communist guerrillas. This was a serious obstacle for the
7
8
Erich Kern, quoted by De Lannoy, op. cit.
Les cosaques de Von Pannwitz, idem.
50
General Simon Krasnov: Miguel’s father.
transit of German troops and convoys that communicated
with Austrian territory through the high valley of
Tagliamento. This is why the high-ranking German military
leaders asked for the Cossacks to be sent there. Already
tried in the fight against the Yugoslavian guerrillas, here
they repeated their deeds with even more success.
This was a high mountain region populated by
shepherds and poor farmers.
Pier Arriego –eyewitness– tells us that at the cry of
“The Cossacks are coming!”, the dwellers, terrified would
hide, taking care of reinforcing the bars of their doors. They
were already displeased for the presence of the communist
brigades –who acted on the side of the allied authorities
and whose language, full of hatred, intimidated them. Now
they would also have to bear the frightful Cossacks and
certainly –even though they didn’t want to– they would
have to feed them all…
At last, in the summer of 1944, their troops
arrived and the battle against the Marxist brigades began
immediately. Among forests and rugged ground, cliffs and
hidden paths, the Reds thought they were protected, but the
Cossacks gave them no quarter. They, men of the Steppes,
adapted immediately to the mountains, the perfect scenario
for cleverness and surprises, ambush and bold stratagems.
The Marxist brigades, who had achieved a certain degree of
cohesion, began to dislocate.
Whereas, among the alpine dwellers, fear had given
way to friendship. “The Cossacks –says Arrigo– individually
and in the cohabitation of the home, were good, humble
and primitive. They represented the olden-time sweetness
of the Russian soul. But in combat they suddenly changed,
as if a second personality showed in them.”
In his book9 he tells us some picturesque episodes
that let us penetrate the simple soul of both the Cossacks
and the Italian highlanders. Behind one of the highest
neighboring peaks –the Pani– lived a solitary old man who
9
L’Armata Cosacca in Italia.
52
was greatly appreciated by the shepherds and woodcutters
of the region. His name was Antonio Zanella, but he was
well known as the Ors di Pani (the Bear of Pani). The old
man was generous and in the harsh winter of the war
nobody in distress who sought help from him would come
back empty-handed: a piece of bread, cheese from his dairy,
even a lamb from his flocks would alleviate the hunger of
the needy. But these aids were also open to the communist
guerrillas and this was serious. In the position of “helper”
of the enemy, the Cossacks decided to apply the laws of
war against him: death penalty. Those in charge of carrying
out the sentence climbed up to the desolate and abandoned
mountain top. They found the Bear and when they saw his
countenance they were stupefied: it was a Biblical figure,
very tall, dressed poorly; he had long white hair and a
patriarchal beard. When the Cossacks announced their
somber mission, he fixed his magnetic blue eyes on them
but didn’t say a word.
The Cossacks felt disarmed: wasn’t this ageless man,
who seemed to come from the bottom of Time, an anchoret?
Maybe a saint too?
And if he had given food to the ferocious Reds, was
he really so guilty?
If he had refused, they simply would have killed
him… Furthermore, this figure seemed familiar to them: he
looked like a kulak.10
Were they going to kill him just as Communists did?
And they decided to grant him his life.
The primitive man of the Steppes and the primitive
man of the highlands had identified above all the centuries
and the war.
One week later the Cossacks climbed to the peak
once more to visit the old Bear. They took a papaja (Russian
hat) of white lamb, the maximum tribute of friendship.
One day a rumor began among the Cossack militia
that Ataman Piotr Krasnov would come. His sole name
10
Kulak. Small farmers of Russia who Stalin had sent to kill in mass.
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The “Bear” of Pani
electrified the soldiers. His figure appeared almost as
immaterial, like an epic image from other times.
In effect, on February 27 of 1945, at sunset in
Versegnis Villa, near Udine, the numerous escorts that
accompanied the prince appeared. He was escorted by a
selected guard of Cossacks, then followed the officers of
his staff, among whom was his son, Major General Simon
Krasnov, his closest and most faithful collaborator. Along
with the Ataman came his wife, Princess Lydia Fedorovna,
who always accompanied him and who, despite of her age,
still looked extraordinarily beautiful.
The princes descended from the carriage in which
they traveled, but they didn’t enter the cabin assigned to
them. A multitude of Cossacks surrounded them. They
kneeled down and paid tribute to them by beating their
swords against the ground. Then, three Cossacks offered
him a silver platter with rice. Bending forward, he kissed it.
These exotic welcome rituals encouraged the
curiosity and sympathy of the people who had been so
fearful before. But, naturally, it wasn’t easy to approach
the noble Cossack chief. He was always walled in by his
people and besides that he was a man who was accustomed
to relating to authorities and heads of State. He refused,
therefore, to receive representatives that did not form part
of the high commands or Russian nobility.
But in the village of Versegnis he made an exception:
he visited the parish priest, don Graciano Boria, and they
talked extensively. When they bid farewell, the Ataman
gave him his last book, the novel Hatred, with a dedication
in perfect Italian: “To the Most Reverend don Boria, for his
unexpected hospitality.”
There were other encounters between these two men,
friendlier and more confidential each time. In one of them,
the Ataman wanted to justify his soldiers: “My Cossacks
are good,” he said, “but they have hardened throughout
the unending and dangerous adventures.”
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Don Boria was a loquacious and frank man. He took
advantage of the occasion to try to influence the military
leader, begging him to control the pillaging of his soldiers
more. This humble plea of the priest touched the old prince’s
heart, and since then, the Cossacks’ forays that affected the
highlanders, who were already impoverished by the war
and the winter, decreased.
But, in the meantime, the events were inevitably
coming to their end. The German troops were retreating
from every front. The Cossack authorities consulted each
other on the imminent armistice. Their regiments were
dispersed but close and the agreements among them were
not difficult. Krasnov, Von Pannwitz, Schkuro, and even
Domanov, who was the only Soviet among them, agreed
on the fact that what was most convenient was to move
towards the zone occupied by the English. For this, it was
necessary to descend toward Austria, occupied by British
troops. Besides this, Krasnov personally trusted Marshal
Alexander, whom he knew and estimated as a proper man
as well as the highest military authority of the zone.
In those secret agreements Major General Simon
Krasnov was assigned the mission of maintaining the
contact with General Vlassov’s quarters, in Berlin, to
coordinate a common action. Vlassov was not Cossack, but
he was an ex-Soviet officer who, taken prisoner during the
first days, took part on the German’s side, determined to
combat Communism with them.
In consequence, in the spring of 1945, the orders
conductive to abandon alpine Italy and lead the Cossacks
to the Austrian plains, where they would all meet, were
given.
After them, full of hatred, remained the diminished
and disorganized Communist brigades who had suffered
serious losses in the hands of the Cossacks. Naturally,
the news of the retreat of their enemies reached them.
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Reasonably estimating that these retreating soldiers must
have felt demoralized, they planned one last act of revenge:
to fall on their columns in retreat and –in the Ovaro
garrison– surround them, cutting off their retreat.
It was an unrealistic attack, but it caused painful
losses among the Cossacks during the first moments. These
reacted with fury. The descending was suspended and from
everywhere soldiers arrived to support their companions.
The so planned attack turned into a true battle that lasted
from that morning until the evening of May 2.
The Communist guerrillas were totally defeated.
This is how Ovaro became the Cossacks’ last victory in the
vast scenario of the world war.
On the next day they set out on their march once
more. With bad weather and rough roads, the descending
was painful. But finally, among the members of the advance
guard, a cheerful cry was heard, “Osterreich!... Osterreich!”
(“Austria!... Austria!”)
The Cossack groups, under the command of their
leaders, converged from Italy and from Yugoslavia towards
the plains, so that they quartered along the valley of the
Drave River, close to Lienz, Oberdrauburg, Völkertmacht,
Feldkirchen, and other neighboring towns.
How many were they? The most trustworthy
historians agree that estimated number of officers and
soldiers amounted up to a total of fifty thousand men,
without counting the families that followed them.11 Among
the authorities that lead them was Ataman Piotr Krasnov
with his relatives, whom we already know. To these we can
add Marshal Von Pannwitz, General Schkuro, also a hero of
World War I, General Domanov, and Sultan Guirey Klytch,
chief of 4,000 Caucasians, enemies of Communism as much
as the Cossacks.
11
De Lannoy and Bethel.
57