On June 22, 1941, the German Reich invades the Soviet Union. Until the end of the war, the Wehrmacht captures about 5.7 million servicemen and women of the Red Army. Their treatment is criminal. Anti-Bolshevik and racist attitudes play just as much a role as military and economic interests of the Nazi regime. In total, more than three million Soviet prisoners of war perish. A large number of them are shot. Most of them die of hunger and disease due to completely inadequate supplies, especially by the spring of 1942. In the Soviet Union, the survivors are confronted with the distrust of the authorities. They are under general suspicion of treason and are socially disadvantaged for decades.

With more than three million dead, Soviet prisoners of war are one of the largest groups of victims of German mass crimes. Yet to this day they are hardly remembered.

The exhibition offers an initial introduction to the subject. Nine chapters provide a thematic overview up to the present day, biographies present individual fates, a map of Europe shows selected camp locations and numbers of victims, and media stations enable research into selected memorial sites and a source-critical examination of photography(s).

The exhibition will be accompanied by a series of lectures. The dates and topics as well as further information can be found here: https://www.museum-karlshorst.de/dimensionen-eines-verbrechens

Cooperation partners in this project are: German-Russian Museum Berlin-Karlshorst, German Historical Institute Moscow, Flossenbürg Concentration Camp Memorial, Lower Saxony Memorials Foundation, German War Graves Commission

Supported by the cooperation partners and: Federal Foreign Office, Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media