Wilfried Strik-Strikfeldt

Wilfried Karl Strik-Strikfeldt (Russian: Вильфрид Карлович Штрик-Штрикфельдт; 23 July 1896 – 7 September 1977) was a Baltic German soldier involved with General Vlasov and the German sponsored Russian Liberation Army of World War Two.

Early years

Strik-Strikfeldt was born in Riga and attended the Russian Imperial Cavalry School in St. Petersburg. He attended the centenary celebrations of the Battle of Borodino and during World War I volunteered to fight as an officer in the Russian Imperial Army against the Kaiser‘s Germany. During the Russian Civil War he fought the Bolsheviks in the Baltic countries and Ingria, as a supporter of the White movement.

In 1920 he met Gustav Hilger (later a Counsellor to the German Embassy in Moscow over 1939-41) in his capacity as an official co-ordinating efforts to repatriate Austrian and German PoWs after the war. That same year Strik-Strikfeldt set up shop in Riga, Latvia, as a representative of British and German heavy engineering firms.

In the early 1920s Strik-Strikfeldt was involved in Fridtjof Nansen's activities to alleviate the Great Famine in Russia. Between 1924 and 1939 he represented the interests of British and German companies in Latvia.

Germany

In late 1939 he joined the Baltic Volksdeutsche "repatriated" to Nazi Germany following the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. His family was settled in Posen, the administrative capital of the Warthegau.

In early 1941 he was interviewed by a Wehrmacht Staff Officer in Posen and asked to undertake an interpreter’s examination in Berlin where he was awarded a certificate "Interpreter Class A". Due to his service in the former Russian Imperial Army he was only inducted into the Wehrmacht as a Captain. He was initially attached to Field-Marshal von Bock's HQ in the Warthegau, where he met and worked with Generalmajor (Major-General) Reinhard Gehlen and Major General Henning von Tresckow. Gehlen encouraged him to lecture to other Wehrmacht officers during the war on "Der Russische Mensch" (the Russian as Human Being) and even helped distribute Strik-Strikfeldt's lecture as an official OKW Propaganda Department paper to intelligence officers along the front line.

Early in 1942 Strik-Strikfeldt was transferred to the Oberkommando des Heeres (OKH) "War Booty Collection Centre" office in Angerburg, East Prussia, to sort through captured Russian military papers and documents for the "Foreign Forces—East" (Fremde Heere Ost) of the Wehrmacht General Staff. In the Spring and Summer he worked briefly with Gehlen and Claus von Stauffenberg.

Over July and August 1942 Strik-Strikfeldt met and interviewed ex-Communist and former Soviet Army General Andrey Vlasov in a German PoW camp in Vinnitsa. The two developed a close rapport, with Vlasov addressing Strik-Strikfeldt privately by a Russian pet nickname "Wilfried Karlovich". In September 1942 Strik-Strikfeldt was formally seconded to the OKW Propaganda Department office in Berlin as a "Betreuer" (Confidante) responsible for Vlasov.

"In August 1942 I arrived in Berlin. The so-called Russian Collaboration Staff of the OKW/Pr was located in the Viktoriastrasse under lock and key. Barred windows, wooden bunks. Straw mattresses. No permission to leave the building. All doors were locked at night. I was shocked."

Dabendorf

Early in November 1942 Gehlen and von Stauffenberg were able to authorize the establishment of a “training camp for Russian volunteers, to be known as Ost-propagandaabteilung z.b.V….The proposed camp, with huts, at Dabendorf, was not far from Berlin. In due course the Ostpropagandaabteilung was known simply as Dabendorf.”

The “Propagandaabteilung Dabendorf” was granted the status of an independent battalion commanded by Captain Strik-Strikfeldt and although initially conceived as a 50-strong unit, he immediately pushed to increase its size to 1200.

“My official task, with that of my German and Russian staff, was to recruit and train ‘propagandists’, i.e. Betreuer, for the Russian Volunteers and Auxiliaries and the same for all permanent and transit prison camps throughout the whole of German-dominated Europe.”

At Dabendorf Strik-Strikfeldt and his staff initiated two Russian language newspapers : “Dobrovolets” (Volunteers) for the ordinary Russian volunteers and auxiliaries serving in the Wehrmacht and “Zariya” (Dawn) for the PoWs. Strik-Strikfeldt also persuaded Vlasov to publish, in March 1943, his article “Why I took up the struggle against Bolshevism” (a bitter attack on the Soviet system) and in April 1943, his pamphlet on the nationalities/minorities issue within Russia and Europe.

In February 1943 Sergei Frohlich, a “resettled” Baltic Volksdeutsche from Riga working in the HQ staff of the SA, was appointed liaison officer with Vlasov’s staff. Strik-Strikfeldt knew Frohlich well as they had played ice hockey in rival teams as youth. Frohlich was able to help provide Strik-Strikfeldt, Vlasov and Dabendorf with small arms, extra food rations and quarters.

In 1943 Strik-Strikfeldt escorted Vlasov to Vienna where he served as an interpreter at an official meeting with Baldur von Schirach. Then he took Vlasov to Munich and the Allgäu in Bavaria. Afterwards they travelled together to Frankfurt and Mainz, and took a steamer down the Rhine to Cologne. Later they met with Dr Julius Lippert (the Lord Mayor of Berlin) and also the Reich Minister of Finance, Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, to discuss the Russian liberation movement and the urgent need to reform the treatment of Russian labourers inside Germany.

“I regarded Dabendorf as the heart of the Russian Liberation Movement and as a purely Russian centre. So that from the beginning I had refrained from any sort of interference in Russian affairs.”

By late Autumn 1943 Dabendorf was under constant criticism from the Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories (the Ostministerium), the Sicherheitsdienst (SD or Security Service) of the SS, and even rival elements within the Wehrmacht who wanted to absorb and “assimilate” Dabendorf. When many Russian Hiwi’s were withdrawn from the Eastern Front and sent to work on fortifications in the West, Dabendorf sent propagandists to raise morale and soothe troubled spirits. However several were arrested in France and others sent directly back to Dabendorf. Strik-Strikfeldt was obliged to travel to Paris and liaise with the German military authorities there.

In January 1944 Strik-Strikfeldt was interviewed by General Kostring when the later was appointed head of the Osttruppen formations. Kostring confirmed that the Führer would never deviate from his Russian policy and told Strik-Strikfeldt : “The fact is that Hitler will have nothing to do with Vlasov.’’

The SS

In the Spring of 1944 Strik-Strikfeldt was introduced to SS Standartenführer Gunter d'Alquen (Chief Editor of the SS weekly, Das Schwarze Korps / "The Black Corps"), and commander of the SS-Standarte Kurt Eggers. Henceforth some senior SS officers began to take a positive interest in Vlasov and his movement. The most interested was Dr Arlt, head of the Freiwilligen-Leitstelle-Ost (Free Volunteers office - East). Dr Arlt informed Strik-Strikfeldt that the Waffen-SS intended to make greater use of Soviet and Eastern European minorities under SS auspices. Strik-Strikfeldt also held meetings at this time with SS-Gruppenführer Otto Ohlendorf, SS-Brigadeführer Walter Schellenberg and Dr.Otto Wächter (later involved in the Waffen SS Division "Galicia" or 14th Grenadier Division of the Waffen SS Galicia).

Strik-Strikfeldt was even initially interviewed by the head of the SS recruitment office, SS General Gottlob Berger. Strik-Strikfeldt was then obliged to arrange a personal meeting between Vlasov and Gottlob Berger where the later appointed SS Oberführer Erhard Kroeger as a formal liaison officer between Vlasov and the SS. Strik-Strikfeldt agreed since Kroeger had been involved in the resettlement of Baltic Volksdeutsche over 1939-1940. At this meeting Berger also proposed a formal meeting between Vlasov and Heinrich Himmler.

“It seemed that the SS now, in the early summer of 1944, were to take the opportunity that the Wehrmacht had missed back in 1941.”

On 16 September 1944 Strik-Strikfeldt and Vlasov met the Reichsführer-SS at the later’s field HQ in Rastenburg, East Prussia. Himmler had been placed in command of the Ersatzarmee following the 20 July plot, and was therefore in a position to supply Dabendorf with military equipment and training, and even offered vague political concessions. An official Communiqué was issued to mark the occasion. Returning to Berlin in a train, Strik-Strikfeldt shared a sleeper with Dr. Felix Kersten (Himmler’s personal physician and an Estonian-born Baltic German) who claimed to have been supporting their “good cause”. There was an enthusiastic reception for Captain Strik-Strikfeldt and General Vlasov at Dabendorf and work began immediately to prepare the ill fated Manifesto of the “Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia”.

“When General Gehlen came back to duty I gave him an unvarnished report. Himmler had appointed the SS General Berger as his plenipotentiary in all Russian affairs. Kroeger was liaison officer. SS Colonel Burg had the task of setting up the Russian divisions. Gehlen asked me to stay with Vlasov for as long as I could.”

Late in 1944 Strik-Strikfeldt met the Cossack White Army era General Pyotr Krasnov and tried to convince him to join Vlasov but to no avail.

Strik-Strikfeldt was not invited to Prague for the formal ceremony declaring the Manifesto of the “Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia”. However General Gehlen ordered him to arrange a meeting and translate between Vlasov and General Kostring, so he was present at the official programme. At the evening banquet Vlasov made a speech and publicly acknowledged an "unnamed German officer of the rank of Captain."

“Later, I was invited to join Vlasov and Zhilenkov at a table where they were sitting with a senior SS officer. He turned out to be deputy head of Personnel Department of the Waffen SS. They quickly came to the point : I should transfer to the SS and remain with Vlasov. Vlasov emphasized that this was not his proposal, though he would be glad if I were to come back to him.”

Strik-Strikfeldt tried to squirm out of the offer and Gehlen arranged for him to take sick leave in Pomerania where he wrote up a rough draft history of the Vlasov movement that would later serve as the basis for his 1970 book "Gegen Stalin und Hitler. General Wlassow und die russische Freiheitsbewegung" (Against Stalin and Hitler: Memoir of the Russian Liberation Movement). In December 1944 one of Gehlen’s officers visited Strik-Strikfeldt and asked him to help accommodate units of the Russian Liberation Army in the Posen area.

“A fellow-Balt provided an introduction to Greiser, who quickly grasped the position and promised help.”

On 20 January 1945 Strik-Strikfeldt’s wife, and daughter Dela, were evacuated from Posen. Three days later Sergei Frohlich ordered him to travel to Frankfurt an der Oder immediately, whence he was collected and taken to Dabendorf.

“I went to Zossen to see General Gehlen, who told me to go and find my family. After many adventures I found them in the little village of Sallgast between Finsterwalde and Senftenberg. My mother wanted to stay there, she was tired of being on the move. All her life she had been a refugee.”

In early April 1945 Gehlen had Strik-Strikfeldt posted as sick and after some confusion at the OKH, he left and took his family to the Allgäu. On 14 April Vlasov, Kroeger and a few senior officers of the Russian Liberation Army tracked him down and they had their last meeting. Strik-Strikfeldt agreed to negotiate their surrender with the Western powers. Interrogated by the US Colonel Snyder and later General Patch, Strik-Strikfeldt became a PoW and was moved to Augsburg where he was interned with Goring and Gehlen amongst others. Later he was transferred to Mannheim and interned with Field-Marshals von Blomberg, Wilhelm von List, von Weichs and von Leeb; and Generals Guderian and Kostring. Here he also met up with Gustav Hilger again and Hitler’s personal photographer Heinrich Hoffmann.

Death

Strik-Strikfeldt died in Oberstaufen. His 1970 memoirs, "Gegen Stalin und Hitler. General Wlassow und die russische Freiheitsbewegung" (Against Stalin and Hitler: Memoir of the Russian Liberation Movement), are an important source regarding the Russian Liberation Movement and General Vlasov, and also the axiomatic role played by Baltic Germans.

Literature

• Strik-Strikfeldt, W. Against Stalin and Hitler: Memoir of the Russian Liberation Movement, 1941-1945. — NY: Day, 1970. ISBN 0-381-98185-1 ISBN 978-0-381-98185-3
• Вильфрид Штрик-Штрикфельдт: Против Сталина и Гитлера. Изд. Посев, 1975, 2003. ISBN 5-85824-005-4
• Бахвалов Анатолий: Генерал Власов. Предатель или герой? Изд. СПб ВШ МВД России, 1994.
• Sven Steenberg: Wlassow. Verräter oder Patriot? Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Köln 1968.
• Свен Стеенберг: Генерал Власов. Изд-во Эксмо, 2005. ISBN 5-699-12827-1
• Sergej Frölich: General Wlassow. Russen und Deutsche zwischen Hitler und Stalin.
• Cергей Фрёлих Генерал Власов. Русские и Немцы между Гитлером и Сталиным (перевод с немецкого Ю.К. Мейера при участии Д.А. Левицкого), 1990. Printed by Hermitage.
• Александров Кирилл М.: Армия генерала Власова 1944-45. Изд-во Эксмо, 2006. ISBN 5-699-15429-9.
• Чуев Сергей: Власовцы - Пасынки Третьего Рейха. Изд-во Эксмо, 2006. ISBN 5-699-14989-9.

И. Хоффманн: История власовской армии. Перевод с немецкого Е. Гессен. 1990 YMCA Press ISBN 2-85065-175-3 ISSN 1140-0854

• Joachim Hoffmann: Die Tragödie der 'Russischen Befreiungsarmee' 1944/45. Wlassow gegen Stalin. Herbig Verlag, 2003 ISBN 3776623306.
• Гофман Иоахим: Власов против Сталина. Трагедия Русской Освободительной Армии. Пер. с нем. В. Ф. Дизендорфа. Изд-во АСТ, 2006. ISBN 5-17-027146-8.
• О. В. Вишлёв(preface): Генерал Власов в планах гитлеровских спецслужб. Новая и Новейшая История, 4/96, pp. 130–146.
• В. В. Малиновский: Кто он, русский коллаборационнист: Патриот или предатель?' Вопросы Истории 11-12/96, pp. 164–166. [letter to the editor]
• А. Ф. Катусев, В. Г. Оппоков: Иуды. Власовцы на службе у фашизма. Военно-Исторический Журнал 6/1990, pp. 68–81.
• П. А. Пальчиков: История Генерала Власова. Новая и Новейшая История, 2/1993, pp. 123–144.
• А. В. Тишков: Предатель перед Советским Судом. Советское Государство и Право, 2/1973, pp. 89–98.
• Л. Е. Решин, В. С. Степанов: Судьбы генералские. Военно-Исторический Журнал, 3/1993, pp. 4–15.
• С. В. Ермаченков, А. Н. Почтарев: Последний поход власовской армии. Вопросы Истории, 8/98, pp. 94–104.