Germany caused billions of damage to the USSR in World War II: why it did not pay reparations

  • Jun 06, 2021
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The most important stage of the Second World War - the defeat of Germany - ended on May 8, 1945 with the surrender of the Reich to the USSR and the Allies. During the 5 years of the war, the country of the Soviets suffered colossal damage: destroyed cities and enterprises, destroyed villages and collective farms, spoiled soil, exported resources and values, physically destroyed citizens. The total damage to the USSR from Germany amounted to $ 357 billion. The national wealth fell by a third. Where are the well-deserved reparations for all this?
The most important stage of the Second World War - the defeat of Germany - ended on May 8, 1945 with the surrender of the Reich to the USSR and the Allies. During the 5 years of the war, the country of the Soviets suffered colossal damage: destroyed cities and enterprises, destroyed villages and collective farms, spoiled soil, exported resources and values, physically destroyed citizens. The total damage to the USSR from Germany amounted to $ 357 billion. The national wealth fell by a third. Where are the well-deserved reparations for all this?
The most important stage of the Second World War - the defeat of Germany - ended on May 8, 1945 with the surrender of the Reich to the USSR and the Allies. During the 5 years of the war, the country of the Soviets suffered colossal damage: destroyed cities and enterprises, destroyed villages and collective farms, spoiled soil, exported resources and values, physically destroyed citizens. The total damage to the USSR from Germany amounted to $ 357 billion. The national wealth fell by a third. Where are the well-deserved reparations for all this?
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The main contribution to the victory was made by the USSR. | Photo: sputnik-ossetia.ru.
The main contribution to the victory was made by the USSR. | Photo: sputnik-ossetia.ru.
The main contribution to the victory was made by the USSR. | Photo: sputnik-ossetia.ru.

In fact, there were reparations from Germany. True, the ex-Reich was ultimately able to compensate for only about 5% of all the damage caused to the USSR. A significant part of the reparations was taken by the USSR as war booty. First of all, these were cars, bicycles, stocks of various raw materials, machine tools for factories, various construction and industrial equipment, wagons and tractors, food. According to modern German scientists, a total of $ 15.8 billion was exported from Germany, which is equivalent to about 14 thousand tons of gold. For comparison, the EU gold reserve is about 10 thousand tons of gold.

The losses of the USSR in the war, Germany would make up for another couple of centuries. | Photo: pokazuha.org.
The losses of the USSR in the war, Germany would make up for another couple of centuries. | Photo: pokazuha.org.

Part of the reparations in the form of trophies in favor of the USSR was withdrawn from the occupied territory of Germany by the allied countries. Under international treaties, the United States transferred 25% of all its trophies to the USSR. Interestingly, as a result of the war, 15% of all trophy production of the Soviet Union was transferred to Poland, which was recognized as the most affected party in the world conflict. The seizure of trophies was carried out not only in defeated Germany, but also in other Axis countries.

The reparations were partially paid in the form of trophies. | Photo: shotguncollector.com.

Not only material values ​​were exported from Germany. The Soviet Union was also interested in technology. In addition, people were taken out of Germany for forced labor: men from 17 to 45 years old and women from 18 to 30 years old. About 155 thousand people were sent to the USSR from the eastern part of Germany. Another 115 thousand people were sent to the USSR from other countries of the Nazi bloc. For the most part, all of these citizens were members of the Volkssturm (people's militia) or were members of Nazi organizations. Their labor was seen as a form of reparations. All of them were aimed at restoring the national economy of the Soviet Union in a variety of areas. The overwhelming majority worked in the territories of modern Ukraine, Belarus, Poland and the Baltic countries. POW labor was also considered part of the reparations.

Some of the reparations were compensated for by labor of prisoners of war and those taken for forced labor in the USSR. | Photo: joker.ykt.ru.

The final decisions on the reparations of the Axis countries were worked out by the USSR and the Allies at the Yalta and Potsdam conferences in 1945. So, officially, reparations were imposed on Germany. It was only in 1953 that all their payments ceased. The USSR and Poland refused to receive further reparations for several reasons. Firstly, even at the beginning of 1953, there was nothing to take from Germany in the volume that was really required: the country itself was rebuilding after the war. Secondly, the decision was political, since the USSR needed to strengthen the unity of the Eastern bloc in the context of the outbreak of the Cold War.

Germany itself was destroyed by the war, and then it was physically impossible to take full reparations. ¦Photo: dmitrschool04.ru.

If you want to know even more interesting things, then you should read about why our name is MP-40 "Schmeisser", if the machine was not made by Hugo Schmeisser.
A source: https://novate.ru/blogs/120121/57396/