Tag #155309 - Interview #94498 (Evadiy Rubalskiy)

There were SMERSH officers of NKVD units in all regiments during the war [SMERSH is the abbreviation of ‘Smert Shpionam’ ("Death to Spies" in Russian), special secret military unit for elimination of spies. SMERSH is actually the Ninth Division of the KGB, originally created into five separate sections. The first section works inside the Red Army]. Their function was to capture spies, as one can see from the name, but they actually monitored the army and each individual. It was the same at peaceful times, when NKVD kept the life of each individual under control. I witnessed four executions in our regiment: a first sergeant, a lieutenant and two privates. They remained behind the regiment during a march and were convicted of desertion, though I’m sure that there was no such intention. They must have been just worn out, but they were shot after the SMERSH officer issued his verdict. Later the commandment set an order to grant them life, but the SMERSH officer replied that they had been executed: and that was that. When we set feet in other countries, the SMERSH officers got engaged in dealing with our prisoners-of-war. We never blamed those who had been captured be the enemy: we knew how it could happen. Often people were captured when they were lying wounded in the fields: and who was to blame that our nurses had failed to take them to hospitals? Anything could happen. However, those prisoners, who had had their portion of hardships in fascist camps were convicted of having surrendered and were sent to the GULAG in Siberia.