For Russia with Hitler: White Russian Émigrés and the German-Soviet War

by Oleg Beyda

The Bolshevik takeover of Russia created an alternative Russia in exile which never laid down its arms. For two decades, expunged White Russians sought ways to retaliate against the Soviet Union and return home. Their irreconcilability was galvanized by a superstructure, the dominant military organization, the Russian All-Military Union (ROVS). Eventually, militant anti-Bolshevism led the exiled Russians into alliance with Nazi Germany, despite the latter’s anti-Slavic stance.

For Russia with Hitler tells the story of how thousands of White Russian émigrés joined the German invasion of the Soviet Union as soldiers, translators, and civilian workers. Oleg Beyda investigates and contextualizes émigré collaboration with National Socialist Germany, explaining how it was possible for Russians to fight against the Russians. The book reveals that the exiles, although united ideologically by Russian nationalism in a general sense, did not establish one single, clear-cut political solution for a future “liberated Russia.” Drawing on wide archival material, For Russia with Hitler details the background and ideological framework of the émigrés, how they rationalized their support for Nazism, and what they did on the Eastern Front, including their reactions to life in occupation, war crimes, and the Holocaust.

Genres: World War II

392 pages, Hardcover

First published September 15, 2024