Open Wound : The Genocide of German Ethnic Minorities in Russia and the Soviet Union: 1915-1949 and Beyond (English and German Edition)

Undoubtedly, the twentieth century - the so-called "century of progress" - was an unprecedented era of blood and mass murder. Nazi and Soviet genocides killed tens of millions, some estimating 60 million. The Open Wound, a dual-language volume in English and German, carefully and critically examines the available statistical data from Soviet archives released after Glasnost relating to the number of Russian Germans who perished under the Soviets. Based on these and other archival sources from Germany and America, between 1915 and 1949, about one million Russian Germans needlessly perished under the last Russian Tsar, Lenin and Stalin. The deaths resulted mainly from mass deportations, executions, man-made famines, and enforced labor in the Gulag. The book also presents numerous gripping eyewitness accounts from Russian-German survivors and genocide victims. These first-hand reports present heart-rending and often near-apocalyptic scenes of mass death and near complete extermination. The Open Wound recognizes that Russian Germans were not the only ethnic group which suffered in the Soviet Union. Nearly every ethnic group, including the Russian majority, was repressed under Lenin and Stalin for a variety of reasons, including the volatile combination of political ideology and traditional racial conflicts. This shows that the recent genocidal events in Bosnia are merely the repetition of an old theme. Many Russian Germans will discover in this book the names of familiar ancestral villages, as well as those of their own families and relatives. Non-Russian Germans who read the book will also identify with and be touched by a suffering that reaches across ethnic lines and which can be humanly understood and felt. The silenced victims of starvation, shooting and death by forced labor are given a voice to speak again, telling us their story. This book makes known their suffering, ensuring it is never forgotten by relatives nor by the world.