How the first act of surrender was signed in Reims. The act of surrender of Germany was signed in Berlin

TASS-DOSSIER /Alexey Isaev/. On May 8, 1945, the Act on unconditional surrender German armed forces.

The document, signed in Reims at the level of chiefs of staff, was initially of a preliminary nature. Supreme Commander General Eisenhower did not sign the Joint Allied Expeditionary Forces. Moreover, he agreed to go to a “more official” ceremony in Berlin on May 8. However, political pressure was exerted on Eisenhower, both from Winston Churchill and from US political circles, and he was forced to abandon his trip to Berlin.

By order from Moscow by a representative of the Supreme High Command Soviet troops The commander of the 1st Belorussian Front, Marshal, was appointed to sign the Act Soviet Union Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov. On the morning of May 8, Andrei Vyshinsky arrived from Moscow as a political adviser. Zhukov chose the headquarters of the 5th Army as the place for signing the Act of Unconditional Surrender. shock army. It was located in the building of the former military engineering school in the Berlin suburb of Karlshorst. The officers' mess hall was prepared for the ceremony; the furniture was brought from the Reich Chancellery building.

In a short time, Soviet engineering units prepared the road from Tempelhof Airport to Karlshorst, the remains of enemy fortifications and barricades were blown up, and the rubble was cleared. On the morning of May 8, journalists, correspondents from all the largest newspapers and magazines in the world, and photo reporters began arriving in Berlin to capture historical moment legal registration defeat of the Third Reich.

At 14.00 representatives of the High Command arrived at Tempelhof airfield allied forces. They were met by Deputy Army General Sokolovsky, the first commandant of Berlin, Colonel General Berzarin (commander of the 5th Shock Army), and member of the Military Council of the Army, Lieutenant General Bokov.

The High Command of the Allied Expeditionary Forces was represented by Eisenhower's deputy, British Air Chief Marshal Tedder, and the US Armed Forces by the Commander of Strategic air force General Spaats, French Armed Forces - Commander-in-Chief of the Army, General de Lattre de Tassigny. From Flensburg, under the protection of British officers, the former Chief of Staff of the Supreme High Command of the Wehrmacht, Field Marshal Keitel, the Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine, Admiral von Friedeburg, and Colonel General of Aviation Stumpf, who had the authority to sign the Act of Unconditional Surrender from the government of K. Doenitz, were brought to Berlin. The last to arrive was the French delegation.

Exactly at midnight Moscow time, as agreed in advance, the ceremony participants entered the hall. Georgy Zhukov opened the meeting with the words: “We, representatives of the Supreme Command of the Soviet Armed Forces and the Supreme Command of the Allied Forces, are authorized by the governments of the countries anti-Hitler coalition accept the unconditional surrender of Germany from the German military command."

Then Zhukov invited representatives of the German command to the hall. They were asked to sit at a separate table.

After confirming that the representatives of the German side had authority from the government, Denitsa Zhukov and Tedder asked whether they had the Instrument of Surrender in their hands, whether they had become acquainted with it and whether they agreed to sign it. Keitel agreed and prepared to sign the documents at his desk. However, Vyshinsky, as an expert in diplomatic protocol, whispered a few words to Zhukov, and the marshal said loudly: “Not there, but here. I suggest that the representatives of the German High Command come here and sign the Act of Unconditional Surrender.” Keitel was forced to go to a special table placed next to the table at which the Allies were sitting.

Keitel put his signature on all copies of the Act (there were nine of them). Following him, Admiral Friedeburg and Colonel General Stumpf did this.

After this, Zhukov and Tedder signed, followed by General Spaats and General de Lattre de Tassigny as witnesses. At 0 hours 43 minutes on May 9, 1945, the signing of the Act of Unconditional Surrender of Germany was completed. Zhukov invited the German delegation to leave the hall.

The act consisted of six points: “1. We, the undersigned, acting on behalf of the German High Command, agree to the unconditional surrender of all our armed forces on land, sea and air, as well as all forces currently under German command, - to the Supreme Command of the Red Army and at the same time to the Supreme Command of the Allied Expeditionary Forces.

2. The German High Command will immediately issue orders to all German commanders of land, sea and air forces and all forces under German command to cease hostilities at 23.01 hours Central European Time on May 8th, 1945, to remain in their places where they are located at this time, and completely disarm, handing over all their weapons and military equipment to the local Allied commanders or officers assigned by representatives of the Allied High Command, not to destroy or cause any damage to steamships, ships and aircraft, their engines, hulls and equipment, and machinery , weapons, apparatus and all military-technical means of warfare in general.

3. The German High Command will immediately assign the appropriate commanders and ensure that all further orders issued by the Supreme Command of the Red Army and the High Command of the Allied Expeditionary Forces are carried out.

4. This act shall not be an obstacle to its replacement by another general instrument of surrender, concluded by or on behalf of the United Nations, applicable to Germany and the German armed forces as a whole.

5. In the event that the German High Command or any armed forces under its command do not act in accordance with this instrument of surrender, the High Command of the Red Army as well as the High Command of the Allied Expeditionary Forces will take such punitive measures, or other actions they deem necessary.

6. This act is drawn up in Russian, English and German languages. Only Russian and English lyrics are authentic."

The differences from the Act of Surrender signed in Reims were minor in form, but significant in content. So, instead of Soviet High Command (Soviet Supreme Command), the name Supreme High Command of the Red Army was used ( Supreme Command Red Army). Safety clause military equipment has been expanded and supplemented. A separate point was made regarding the language issue. The point about the possibility of signing another document remained unchanged.

The most terrible war in the history of mankind ended with the victory of the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition. Nowadays the Russian-German Surrender Museum operates in Karlshorst.

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, March 3, 1918, was a peace treaty between Germany and the Soviet government regarding Russia's withdrawal from the First World War. This world did not last long, since Germany terminated it on October 5, 1918, and on November 13, 1918, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was terminated by the Soviet side. This happened 2 days after Germany’s surrender in the World War.

Possibility of peace

The issue of Russia's exit from the First World War was extremely relevant. The people largely supported the ideas of the revolution, since the revolutionaries promised a quick exit from the country from the war, which had already lasted 3 years and was extremely negatively perceived by the population.

One of the first decrees of the Soviet government was the decree on peace. After this decree, on November 7, 1917, he addressed all warring countries with an appeal for a speedy conclusion of peace. Only Germany agreed. At the same time, you need to understand that the idea of concluding peace with capitalist countries went against Soviet ideology, which was based on the idea of world revolution. Therefore, there was no unity among the Soviet authorities. And Lenin had to push through the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty of 1918 for a very long time. There were three main groups in the party:

Bukharin. He put forward ideas that the war should continue at any cost. These are the positions of the classical world revolution.
Lenin. He said that peace must be signed on any terms. This was the position of the Russian generals.
Trotsky. He put forward a hypothesis, which today is often formulated as “No war! No peace! It was a position of uncertainty, when Russia disbands the army, but does not leave the war, does not sign a peace treaty. This was an ideal situation for Western countries.

Conclusion of a truce

On November 20, 1917, negotiations began in Brest-Litovsk the coming world. Germany offered to sign an agreement on following conditions: separation from Russia of the territory of Poland, the Baltic states and part of the islands Baltic Sea. In total, it was assumed that Russia would lose up to 160 thousand square kilometers of territory. Lenin was ready to accept these conditions, since he Soviet power there was no army, but generals Russian Empire They unanimously said that the war was lost and peace must be concluded as soon as possible.

Trotsky conducted the negotiations, as people's commissar for foreign affairs. Noteworthy is the fact of the surviving secret telegrams between Trotsky and Lenin during the negotiations. To almost any serious military question, Lenin gave the answer that it was necessary to consult with Stalin. The reason here is not the genius of Joseph Vissarionovich, but that Stalin acted as an intermediary between tsarist army and Lenin.

During the negotiations, Trotsky delayed time in every possible way. He said that a revolution was about to happen in Germany, so you just need to wait. But even if this revolution does not happen, Germany does not have the strength for a new offensive. Therefore, he was playing for time, waiting for the party’s support.
During the negotiations, a truce was concluded between the countries for the period from December 10, 1917 to January 7, 1918.

Why did Trotsky stall for time?

Taking into account the fact that from the first days of negotiations Lenin took the position of unambiguously signing a peace treaty, Troitsky’s support for this idea meant the signing of the Brest Peace Treaty and the end of the epic of the First World War for Russia. But Leiba didn’t do this, why? Historians give two explanations for this:

He was waiting for the German revolution, which was to begin very soon. If this is really so, then Lev Davydovich was an extremely short-sighted person, expecting revolutionary events in a country where the power of the monarchy was quite strong. The revolution eventually happened, but much later than the time when the Bolsheviks expected it.
He represented the position of England, the USA and France. The fact is that with the beginning of the revolution in Russia, Trotsky came to the country precisely from the USA with a large amount money. At the same time, Trotsky was not an entrepreneur, he did not have an inheritance, but he did have large sums of money, the origin of which he never specified. Western countries it was extremely beneficial for Russia to delay negotiations with Germany for as long as possible, so that the latter would leave its troops on eastern front. This is not a lot of 130 divisions, the transfer of which to western front could prolong the war.

The second hypothesis may at first glance smack of conspiracy theory, but it is not without merit. In general, if we consider the activities of Leiba Davydovich in Soviet Russia, then almost all of his steps are related to the interests of England and the United States.

Crisis in negotiations

On January 8, 1918, as was stipulated by the truce, the parties again sat down at the negotiating table. But literally immediately these negotiations were canceled by Trotsky. He referred to the fact that he urgently needed to return to Petrograd for consultations. Arriving in Russia, he raised the question of whether the Brest Peace Treaty should be concluded in the party. In opposition to him was Lenin, who insisted on the speedy signing of peace, but Lenin lost by 9 votes to 7. The revolutionary movements that began in Germany contributed to this.

On January 27, 1918, Germany made a move that few expected. She signed peace with Ukraine. This was a deliberate attempt to pit Russia and Ukraine against each other. But the Soviet government continued to stick to its line. On this day, a decree on the demobilization of the army was signed.

We are leaving the war, but we are forced to refuse to sign a peace treaty.
Trotsky

Of course, this shocked the German side, which could not understand how they could stop fighting and not sign peace.

On February 11 at 17:00, a telegram from Krylenko was sent to all front headquarters that the war was over and it was time to return home. The troops began to retreat, exposing the front line. At the same time, the German command brought Trotsky’s words to Wilhelm, and the Kaiser supported the idea of the offensive.

On February 17, Lenin again made an attempt to persuade party members to sign a peace treaty with Germany. Once again, his position is in the minority, since opponents of the idea of signing peace convinced everyone that if Germany did not go on the offensive in 1.5 months, then it would not go on the offensive further. But they were very wrong.

Signing the agreement

On February 18, 1918, Germany launched a large-scale offensive on all sectors of the front. Russian army was already partially demobilized and the Germans were quietly moving forward. Arose real threat complete seizure of Russian territory by Germany and Austria-Hungary. The only thing the Red Army was able to do was give a small battle on February 23 and slightly slow down the enemy’s advance. Moreover, this battle was given by officers who dressed in soldier's overcoat. But this was one center of resistance that could not solve anything.

Lenin, under the threat of resignation, pushed through the party’s decision to sign a peace treaty with Germany. As a result, negotiations began, which ended very quickly. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed on March 3, 1918 at 17:50.

March 14 4th all-Russian congress councils ratified peace of Brest-Litovsk new contract. As a sign of protest, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries resigned from the government.

The terms of the Brest-Litovsk Peace were as follows:

Complete separation of the territories of Poland and Lithuania from Russia.
Partial separation from Russia of the territory of Latvia, Belarus and Transcaucasia.
Russia completely withdrew its troops from the Baltic states and Finland. Let me remind you that Finland had already been lost before.
The independence of Ukraine was recognized, which came under the protectorate of Germany.
Russia ceded eastern Anatolia, Kars and Ardahan to Turkey.
Russia paid Germany an indemnity of 6 billion marks, which was equal to 3 billion gold rubles.

Under the terms of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Russia lost a territory of 789,000 square kilometers (compare with initial conditions). 56 million people lived in this territory, which accounted for 1/3 of the population of the Russian Empire. Such big losses became possible only because of the position of Trotsky, who first played for time and then brazenly provoked the enemy.

The fate of the Brest peace

It is noteworthy that after signing the agreement, Lenin never used the word “treaty” or “peace”, but replaced them with the word “respite”. And this really was so, because the world did not last long. Already on October 5, 1918, Germany terminated the treaty. The Soviet government dissolved it on November 13, 1918, 2 days after the end of the First World War. In other words, the government waited until Germany was defeated, became convinced that this defeat was irrevocable, and calmly canceled the treaty.

Why was Lenin so afraid to use the word “Brest Peace”? The answer to this question is quite simple. After all, the idea of concluding a peace treaty with capitalist countries went against the theory socialist revolution. Therefore, recognition of the conclusion of peace could be used by Lenin’s opponents to eliminate him. And here Vladimir Ilyich showed quite high flexibility. He made peace with Germany, but in the party he used the word respite. It was because of this word that the decision of the congress to ratify the peace treaty was not published. After all, the publication of these documents using Lenin’s formulation could be met negatively. Germany made peace, but it did not make any respite. Peace puts an end to the war, and a respite implies its continuation. Therefore, Lenin acted wisely by not publishing the decision of the 4th Congress on the ratification of the Brest-Litovsk agreements.

The USSR signed the decree “On ending the state of war between the Soviet Union and Germany” only 10 years after the surrender Hitler's Germany, January 25, 1955. This date is not widely known, it is ignored in history books, and no one celebrates the day the Decree was signed. Doctor historical sciences Yuri Zhukov calls this case a “diplomatic and historical incident.” But the “incident” is not accidental, and it had its own reasons.

Even during the war, in Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam Conference the three great powers reached an agreement regarding Germany after the end of the war. For a long time they could not resolve the territorial question - will Germany exist as one state or will it be fragmented? Stalin insisted that Germany was united, neutral and demilitarized. Why did Stalin insist on such a decision? He simply remembered the consequences of the Treaty of Versailles, when the French occupied the Rhineland and later captured the Ruhr. The Poles took Mountain Silesia. This is what led to the desire to take revenge, to restore what was lost, and as a result, fascism appeared. Stalin took this fact into account, Churchill and Roosevelt did not. The USSR wanted to sign a peace treaty with Germany, which was not divided into 2 parts, but in the end it turned out differently.

On May 8, 1945, in the Berlin suburb of Karlshorst at 22:43 Central European time (May 9 at 0:43 Moscow time), the final Act of unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany and its armed forces was signed. But historically, the Berlin act of surrender was not the first.

When Soviet troops surrounded Berlin, the military leadership of the Third Reich was faced with the question of preserving the remnants of Germany. This was possible only by avoiding unconditional surrender. Then it was decided to capitulate only to the Anglo-American troops, but to continue fighting against the Red Army.

The Germans sent representatives to the Allies to formally confirm the surrender. On the night of May 7, in the French city of Reims, the act of surrender of Germany was concluded, according to which, from 11 p.m. on May 8, hostilities ceased on all fronts. The protocol stipulated that it was not a comprehensive agreement on the surrender of Germany and its armed forces.

However, the Soviet Union put forward a demand for unconditional surrender as the only condition for ending the war. Stalin considered the signing of the act in Reims only a preliminary protocol and was dissatisfied that the act of Germany’s surrender was signed in France, and not in the capital of the aggressor state. Moreover, the fighting Soviet-German front were still going on.

At the insistence of the leadership of the USSR, representatives of the allies reconvened in Berlin and, together with Soviet side On May 8, 1945, another Act of Surrender of Germany was signed. The parties agreed that the first act will be called preliminary, and the second - final.

The final Act of unconditional surrender of Germany and its armed forces was signed on behalf of the German Wehrmacht by Field Marshal W. Keitel, Commander-in-Chief of the Navy Admiral Von Friedeburg, and Colonel General of Aviation G. Stumpf. The USSR was represented by the Deputy Supreme Commander-in-Chief, Marshal of the Soviet Union G. Zhukov, and the allies were represented by the British Air Chief Marshal A. Tedder. U.S. Army General Spaatz and Commander-in-Chief were present as witnesses. French army General Tassigny.

The ceremonial signing of the act took place under the chairmanship of Marshal Zhukov, and the signing ceremony itself took place in the building of the military engineering school, where a special hall was prepared, decorated state flags USSR, USA, England and France. At the main table were representatives of the Allied powers. The Soviet generals whose troops took Berlin, as well as journalists from many countries, were present in the hall.

After the unconditional surrender of Germany, the Wehrmacht government was dissolved, and German troops on the Soviet-German front they began to lay down their arms. In total, from May 9 to May 17, the Red Army captured about 1.5 million enemy soldiers and officers and 101 generals based on the act of surrender. This is how the Great Patriotic War ended Soviet people.

In the USSR, the surrender of Germany was announced on the night of May 9, 1945, and by order of I. Stalin, a grandiose salute of a thousand guns was given in Moscow on that day. By Decree of the Presidium Supreme Council USSR in commemoration of the victorious completion of the Great Patriotic War Soviet people against Nazi invaders and won historical victories May 9 was declared Victory Day by the Red Army.

On May 8, 1945, the Act of Unconditional Surrender of the German Armed Forces was signed in Karlshorst (a suburb of Berlin).

The document, signed in Reims at the level of chiefs of staff, was initially of a preliminary nature. The Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces, General Eisenhower, did not sign. Moreover, he agreed to go to a “more official” ceremony in Berlin on May 8. However, Eisenhower was under political pressure, both from Winston Churchill and from US political circles, and he was forced to abandon his trip to Berlin.

By order from Moscow, the commander of the 1st Belorussian Front, Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov, was appointed as the representative of the Supreme High Command of the Soviet Forces to sign the Act. On the morning of May 8, Andrei Vyshinsky arrived from Moscow as a political adviser. Zhukov chose the headquarters of the 5th Shock Army as the place for signing the Act of Unconditional Surrender. It was located in the building of a former military engineering school in the Berlin suburb of Karlshorst. The officers' mess hall was prepared for the ceremony; the furniture was brought from the Reich Chancellery building.

In a short time, Soviet engineering units prepared the road from Tempelhof Airport to Karlshorst, the remains of enemy fortifications and barricades were blown up, and the rubble was cleared. On the morning of May 8, journalists, correspondents from all the largest newspapers and magazines in the world, and photo reporters began arriving in Berlin to capture the historical moment of the legal formalization of the defeat of the Third Reich.

At 14.00, representatives of the Supreme Command of the Allied Forces arrived at the Tempelhof airfield. They were met by Deputy Army General Sokolovsky, the first commandant of Berlin, Colonel General Berzarin (commander of the 5th Shock Army), and member of the Military Council of the Army, Lieutenant General Bokov.

The High Command of the Allied Expeditionary Force was represented by Eisenhower's deputy, British Air Chief Marshal Tedder, the US armed forces - by the commander of the Strategic Air Forces, General Spaats, and the French armed forces - by the Army Commander-in-Chief, General de Lattre de Tassigny. From Flensburg, under the protection of British officers, the former Chief of Staff of the Supreme High Command of the Wehrmacht, Field Marshal Keitel, the Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine, Admiral von Friedeburg, and Colonel General of Aviation Stumpf, who had the authority to sign the Act of Unconditional Surrender from the government of K. Doenitz, were brought to Berlin. The last to arrive was the French delegation.

Exactly at midnight Moscow time, as agreed in advance, the ceremony participants entered the hall. Georgy Zhukov opened the meeting with the words: “We, representatives of the Supreme Command of the Soviet Armed Forces and the Supreme Command of the Allied Forces, are authorized by the governments of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition to accept the unconditional surrender of Germany from the German military command.”

Then Zhukov invited representatives of the German command to the hall. They were asked to sit at a separate table.

After confirming that the representatives of the German side had authority from the government, Denitsa Zhukov and Tedder asked whether they had the Instrument of Surrender in their hands, whether they had become acquainted with it and whether they agreed to sign it. Keitel agreed and prepared to sign the documents at his desk. However, Vyshinsky, as an expert in diplomatic protocol, whispered a few words to Zhukov, and the marshal said loudly: “Not there, but here. “I suggest that the representatives of the German High Command come here and sign the Act of Unconditional Surrender.” Keitel was forced to go to a special table placed next to the table at which the Allies were sitting.

Keitel put his signature on all copies of the Act (there were nine of them). Following him, Admiral Friedeburg and Colonel General Stumpf did this.

The act consisted of six points: “1. We, the undersigned, acting on behalf of the German High Command, agree to the unconditional surrender of all our armed forces on land, sea and air, as well as all forces currently under German command, to the Supreme Command of the Red Army and at the same time to the Supreme Command Allied Expeditionary Forces.

6. This act is drawn up in Russian, English and German. Only Russian and English texts are authentic.”

The differences from the Act of Surrender signed in Reims were minor in form, but significant in content. So, instead of Soviet High Command (Soviet Supreme Command), the name Supreme High Command of the Red Army (Supreme High Command of the Red Army) was used. The clause on the safety of military equipment was expanded and supplemented. A separate point was made regarding the language issue. The point about the possibility of signing another document remained unchanged.

The most terrible war in the history of mankind ended in victory for the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition. Nowadays the Russian-German Surrender Museum operates in Karlshorst.