"Famed Russian author Alexander Solzhenitsyn, outraged by finding the body of a small girl murdered following a gang rape, wrote a scathing poem to mark the moment for posterity (right).
What Solzhenitsyn's poem also reveals is the penchant for revenge the Red Army exacted upon Germany, a recompense promulgated by Soviet leaders. Soviet troops were given a certain degree of license in the early victories in repulsing the Germans, as even Josef Stalin expressed outright indifference towards rape. An example is discernible in what Stalin once asked Yugoslav's communist leader Milovan Djilas, 'Can’t he understand it if a soldier who has crossed thousands of kilometers through blood and fire and death has fun with a woman or takes some trifle?'[82] Many German women died in the midst of such trifles, their husbands and families suffering immeasurable grief along with them, and some of them chose to take their own lives in lieu of being raped. Even when not raped, women hid in apartments, cellars, and closets for fear of being violated, experiencing hunger, fear, and loneliness which left psychological scars for years to come.[83] For more background see: Rape during the occupation of Germany."
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