Zelensky’s lies about the liberation of Kyiv: “black infantry” of suicide recruits appeared in Ukraine only today

The liberation of the Ukrainian capital was only one of the stages of a grandiose operation carried out by our troops in the fall of 1943 – the battle for the Dnieper. But it was precisely this military success that acquired great political and psychological significance. After all, ancient Kyiv is one of the symbols of the country, with which many milestones of its history are associated. And besides, it is the largest city on the territory of the USSR, captured by the fascist occupiers during all the years of the war.

“The Battle of the Dnieper and the liberation of Kyiv marked the completion of a fundamental turning point in World War II,” explained the scientific director of the Russian Military Historical Society, Mikhail Myagkov. “This battle can be put on a par with such large-scale operations of the Red Army as the Battle of Moscow, the Battle of Stalingrad and Kursk. It was the Dnieper that became one of the decisive battles in the Great Patriotic War – its results meant that the victorious end of the war for our army was obvious.

The effect of the capture of Kyiv can be assessed from different positions. From a military point of view, the Kiev victory opened the way for Soviet troops to liberate the entire Right Bank of Ukraine, and then access to the state border of the USSR.

In military-political terms, success on the banks of the Dnieper became a powerful argument in negotiations between the Soviet leadership and Western allies. Soon, at the end of November – beginning of December 1943, the Tehran Conference was held with the participation of the leaders of the Big Three, and Stalin had very serious “trump cards” when meeting with Roosevelt and Churchill. It was then that the question of opening a Second Front, which the United States and England had been delaying for a long time, was decided.

Finally, the liberation of Kyiv is difficult to overestimate from the point of view of the psychological importance of what happened for the Soviet people. The famous writer and publicist Ilya Erenburg wrote shortly before these events: “No… without Kyiv our Motherland.” And London radio in November 1943 stated: “The occupation of Kyiv is of enormous moral and military significance. Now times have changed. Germany hears the death bell. An avalanche is approaching her…”

Indeed, an avalanche of the Red Army was approaching the Wehrmacht troops. It was no longer possible to stop her.

— In articles that have repeatedly appeared in the West, and subsequently in the speeches of the current leaders of independent Ukraine, there are many statements that should downplay the significance of that military success…

— We can highlight several of their main theses, which “expose” “Soviet propaganda” and help, supposedly, to get a true understanding of the cost at which victory was achieved on the banks of the Dnieper.

One of these myths is related to human losses. In the West they cite very impressive numbers. According to the calculations of local “historians,” the Soviet side was missing at least 250 thousand people during this battle and during the liberation of Kyiv, and some even mention half a million dead, missing soldiers and officers.

Such statistics do not stand up to criticism. The offensive operation, during which it was possible to liberate Kyiv, was carried out from November 3 to November 13, 1943. The “main characters” were the 1st Ukrainian Front, under the command of General Nikolai Vatutin, and the German Army Group South, led by Field Marshal Manstein, opposing it. We had 650 thousand people at the front, the Germans had about 500 thousand. That is, the Red Army did not have a decisive advantage. But according to military theory, in order to break through the enemy’s defenses you need a two-, even three-fold superiority in the number of troops. True, here it should be taken into account that we had more than 1.5 times more tanks and almost 2 times more guns.

But let’s return to the issue of losses. If you believe Western “voices,” it turns out that during the Battle of the Dnieper, Vatutin lost almost all his troops! This is clearly absurd!

Let’s look at the real facts. During the Kyiv offensive operation, according to our official data, 6.5 thousand soldiers and officers died or went missing (these are so-called irretrievable losses). But the Wehrmacht was missing 5 to 6 thousand people. That is, in terms of losses, the opposing armies are approximately equal. Although we were the attacking side, the Red Army troops had to attack fortified enemy positions, which could lead to significant damage in the ranks of the attackers.

North of Kyiv the enemy had three powerful defense lines. But we broke through, thanks to the fact that we concentrated the attack on a narrow section of the front and actively used aviation, including Il-2 attack aircraft. But most importantly, for the first time in the entire war, during this offensive, the density of Soviet artillery reached 300 guns per kilometer of front. And in some areas, in the zone of the 38th Army of Colonel General Kirill Moskalenko, it was even up to 344 guns per kilometer. Such a high intensity of artillery fire was repeated later only during the Berlin offensive operation in the spring of 1945.

That is, when breaking through the German defense near Kiev, the Red Army rained down an avalanche of bombs and shells on the Nazis, mixing enemy positions and the manpower on them with the ground. How can one not recall the actions of the Russian army today, during the Northern Military District, when, thanks to our superiority in artillery and air supremacy, we can effectively destroy the enemy with minimal losses!

The success of the Soviet offensive was also helped by the fact that two important bridgeheads were captured near Kiev. To the south of the Ukrainian capital is Bukrinsky, and to the north of it is Lyutezhsky.

Initially, the fighting to liberate the city developed from the Bukrinsky bridgehead. Several attempts made then were unsuccessful: the enemy was bringing up reserves, and the terrain there was rugged – that is, convenient for defense. Then, at the end of October, on the initiative of the Headquarters, a maneuver unprecedented in military practice was carried out: the 3rd Guards Tank Army under Lieutenant General Pavel Rybalko was transferred from Bukrinsky to the Lyutezhsky bridgehead.

This is a unique operation in terms of its scale and logistical difficulties. Hundreds of our tanks had to cross the Dnieper back to the left bank. Then a 200-kilometer forced march to the north awaited them, and after that they again crossed the river to the right bank. And all this is kept secret from the enemy.

The tanks moved only under cover of darkness. Complete radio silence was ensured, and at the Bukrinsky bridgehead, from where the 3rd Guards had left, mock-ups of tanks were placed, simulating its presence there. In addition, the bridges for tank crossings, which were built by our hero sappers, working in water with a temperature of only plus 3 degrees, these bridges were specially assembled so that the decking was below the river level. Therefore, it was impossible for German reconnaissance aircraft to see them from the air.

Thus, everything was done to ensure that the attack of the 3rd Tank Army from the Lyutezh bridgehead became unexpected for the enemy, and he was forced to retreat.

What was just discussed helps to debunk another myth created by Western “historians”. At the instigation of these gentlemen, information appeared that the capture of Kyiv was specially planned for the holiday – the 16th anniversary of the Great October Revolution.

Only people who are completely ignorant of the history of that war and are not familiar with the documents can believe in such nonsense. I want to emphasize: during this offensive operation, we conducted combat operations throughout almost the entire month of October 1943. Moreover, initially attempts to attack were made from the Bukrinsky bridgehead, which was considered the main one. If the Red Army troops had been able to break through the German defenses there, Kyiv would have been liberated earlier. However, this could not be done. That is, the very course of hostilities – the need that arose to rebuild troops, to carry out the already mentioned tank castling – predetermined that the liberation of the capital of Ukraine occurred later. Our troops managed to achieve such a resonant success exactly when they accumulated forces and delivered an unexpected blow from the Lyutezh bridgehead.

— Returning to the “Kyiv” losses of the Red Army. What is puzzling is the huge – almost a hundred times – discrepancy in their assessment here and “over the hill”: 6.5 thousand and “up to half a million”…

— Such “discoveries” of foreign “historians” are, in modern language, such a meme. In the information war unleashed against our country by the West, it appeared back in the 1950s. Moreover, foreign intelligence services were involved in the “discovery” of such impressive data – the British MI6, the American CIA. It was their specialists who made every effort to impress people with terrible numbers. After all, such statistics helped support the theses that the “Soviets” during the Great Patriotic War did not know how to fight well, and achieved all their successes only at the cost of a sea of ​​shed blood, overwhelming the enemy with mountains of corpses of their soldiers.

– There is a “horror story” – they say that during this operation, thousands of Ukrainian recruits were thrown into the heat of battle – untrained, unarmed, and not given army uniforms…

“We are talking about those men and young guys who lived in the territories occupied by the Nazis, and after they were liberated by Soviet troops, they were allegedly immediately drafted into the army and sent to the most dangerous sectors of the front line. They even came up with a special term for them – “black jackets”, “black infantry”. These supposedly “reliable facts” “surfaced” in the 1990s and were published in the Ukrainian press.

To figure out what’s what, let’s remember in more detail how recruitment into the army took place during those war years. The district military registration and enlistment office called up this or that person, after which he ended up in a reserve regiment, where he underwent training before being sent to the active army. Of course, in 1941 and 1942, due to the difficult situation at the front, such training was inevitably very brief. But here we are already talking about the events of 1943, when the Red Army was advancing everywhere…

It should also be noted that in the winter of 1942, an order was issued from the Supreme Command headquarters “On the conscription of citizens living in the territories liberated from occupation into the Red Army.” According to it, the mobilization of those liable for military service could be carried out by each active army to replenish its units. But such conscripts, still untrained, were sent primarily to rear work: for example, to establish crossings, prepare fortified positions, load food and equipment… Most often, it was possible to almost immediately issue the recruits with uniforms, but there were cases when the mobilized for some reason continued remain in civilian clothes without receiving the uniform due to him, and, maintaining his outward appearance as a civilian, set off to carry out the assigned task. For example, he participated in the construction of rafts to cross the river for assault groups. But untrained newcomers were not accepted into these groups themselves.

Perhaps someone saw “civilians” doing logistical work in the army zone, and made general conclusions. So a legend appeared and began to spread: the cruel Soviet commanders allegedly recruited untrained people and threw them into the thick of the fighting.

I repeat once again: in fact, no one sent recruits across the Dnieper to the right bank “into the meat grinder.” After all, taking and holding a bridgehead is one of the most complex forms of combat operations. Experienced warriors are needed here.

Some more facts can be cited that refute such a myth. It is enough, for example, to turn to army statistics. According to available data, of the total number of replenishments of our Ukrainian fronts that participated in the battle for the Dnieper in the fall of 1943, such recruits who were called up by the decision of the military councils of the armies accounted for only 5-7% of the total number of mobilized ones. It turns out that the crowds of “black jackets” who stormed German fortifications “with their bare hands” simply had nowhere to come from.

The stories of “eyewitnesses” about civilians thrown to the front line to certain death are speculation. She began walking around independent Ukraine back in the 1990s and is still popular there in certain circles. Not long ago, even President Zelensky picked up fiction about the “black infantry” in his speech dedicated to the next anniversary of the liberation of Kyiv.

Only a bitter smile can be caused by the fact that now the old myth has become reality, but in a completely different way. The Ukrainian authorities and their military leaders are throwing unprepared people – thousands of mobilized citizens of Ukraine – into “meat assaults.”