Aware that rape was inflaming German hatred of the Russian army, the Soviet command made efforts to contain the plague after June 1945, going so far as to execute some offenders. The wave of rapine receded somewhat, but the problem did not go away, for each successive contingent of occupation troops wanted to experience the delights of their predecessors upon encountering the fabled Western metropolis. In any event, the Soviets’ belated effort to cultivate an image of “Russian-German friendship” by disciplining their troops did not succeed: memories of the initial occupation were too powerful. Ruth Andreas-Friedrich adumbrated the problem when she wrote on May 29, 1945: “Russia is large. Russia is young, powerful and creative. During the last months under the Nazis nearly all of us were pro-Russian. We waited for the light from the East. But it has burned too many. Too much has happened that cannot be understood. The dark streets still resonate every night with the piercing screams of women in distress. The plundering and shooting, the insecurity and violence aren’t over yet.”
Central Berlin in ruins, 1945
While Red Army soldiers focused their attention on rape and petty thievery, the Soviet command scoured Berlin for more substantial loot. Stalin’s regime was determined to cart away as much industrial and technical equipment as it could, whether or not it was actually usable back home. German workers who had kept the plants running during the war were now forced to help the Soviets dismantle them. The task was huge, for a surprisingly large quantity of machinery had survived the bombing and shelling. In a matter of weeks the Soviets managed to accomplish what the bombs could not: eliminate Berlin as a great industrial city. Between the collapse of Germany in May 1945 and the autumn of that year the Russians removed some 80 percent of Berlin’s machine-tool production, 60 percent of its light industrial capacity, and much of its electrical generating capability. Generators from the great Siemens, Borsig, and AEG plants went off to Russia, along with technicians and engineers who “volunteered” to work in Soviet industrial towns. Berlin of course would eventually build new power plants and industrial enterprises, subsidized after 1949 by West Germany, but it would never again be a great manufacturing center or hold the distinction of being Germany’s Fabrikstadt par excellence.
In addition to industrial equipment, Stalin’s government wanted to grab what if could of Berlin’s vast monetary and artistic resources, which included parts of the stolen treasure amassed by the Nazis. Prime targets for the “Trophy Teams” that Moscow sent to Berlin in May 1945 were the tons of gold bullion thought to reside in the city’s banks and the sacks of foreign currency rumored to have been hidden away by Nazi leaders. The Russians did not get all they had hoped for in this regard, for the Nazis had shipped much of the gold and currency out of the city. The teams had better luck with art, since Hitler had ordered that many of Berlin’s collections be kept in the capital as a sign of faith that it would never fall. Only in the last weeks of the war were a number of major works moved to more secure sites in the provinces, in particular to the giant Kaiseroda-Merkers salt mine in Thuringia. Not only were most of Berlin’s art collections still intact, but many pieces were packed up in protective cases, ready to move. The Soviets began their art-plundering even before the German capitulation, focusing their attention first on the parts of Berlin earmarked for Western occupation. They headed straight for the zoo flak tower and its huge repository of crated treasure, which included Schliemann’s horde of Trojan gold. Like a bank manager being made by robbers to clean out his safe, the director of the Prehistory Museum was conscripted to help the Russians evacuate the tower. The best items were moved to storehouses in the Soviet zone and then shipped to the USSR; less valuable pieces, including some of Hitler’s beloved nineteenth-century kitsch, passed into the possession of individual Trophy Brigade members who fenced them to Berlin shops. Since Berlin’s largest art repository, the Museum Island, was safely in the Russian zone, the Soviets could take their time in looting its famous collections. The buildings were in bad shape owing to the bombardment, and some valuable works, such as the Pergamum Altar and the Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum’s Ravenna mosaics, had been damaged or destroyed. (The situation could have been even worse, however; German curators had narrowly prevented Berlin’s military defenders from using what remained of the Pergamum Altar for a tank barricade.) Over the next months the Soviets took away truckload after truckload of loot from the Museum Island and other sites in their zone, never bothering to leave proper receipts, which scandalized the Germans. Most of this loot ended up in museums in the Soviet Union, where some of it remains to this day.
Trümmerfrauen (rubble women) at work, 1946
Berlin also housed Germany’s most significant collections of books, manuscripts, and documents, which, though perhaps not as glamorous as artworks or gold, constituted another important category of booty for the Soviets. The Trophy Brigades scoured Berlin’s libraries and scientific institutes for historically significant volumes and technical treatises, which they checked out on permanent loan. Less valuable items were carted away by the trainload to serve as decoration and insulation in Soviet apartment houses. The pilfered document collections, which included older Prussian records as well as Nazi-era files, remained in the USSR or went to archives in East Germany—a bane to Western scholars who in coming years would have difficulty gaining access to these materials, if they gained access to them at all.
Performance by the Soviet army’s Alexandrov Ensemble at the Gendamenmarkt, 1948
Taken as a whole, Russia’s rapacious romp through Berlin’s museums, libraries, and archives significantly reduced the city’s status as a center of art and learning. Though by no means the only cause for Berlin’s cultural decline in the postwar era, the removals left gaps and holes that proved much harder to fill in than the vacant lots created by the bombing and shelling. Like its industry and commerce, Berlin’s artistic and intellectual life—especially in the western sectors—would partially recover with time, but the city would never regain its position of cultural dominance within Germany.
Although the Russians fell on Berlin much in the way that hungry Berliners fell on dead horses in the streets, they also saw the German capital as a stage where they could display the virtues of their own system. As General Berzarin, commander-in-chief of Berlin, stated: “Hitler turned Berlin into a city of chaos. We shall make Berlin a city of progress.” Even as some Soviet soldiers continued to loot and rape, the occupiers set about getting things working again. Here the very harshness of their rule was an asset. Just as Berliners were forced to dismantle factories, they were also made to clear rubble from streets, dredge debris from canals, and help repair subway tracks and power lines. Since many of the surviving able-bodied men were either in POW camps or working abroad, much of this labor was done by women—the famous Trümmerfrauen (rubble women), who carted away the ruins brick by brick, stone by stone. As early as May 14, 1945, a path had been cleared for the first busses, and a day later the first U-Bahn subway line reopened. Meanwhile, Soviet army engineers restored electrical power to some districts and set up standpipes where people could obtain potable water. To avert mass starvation, the city’s new rulers handed out food from their own stores and commandeered deliveries from the countryside. As a measure against looting, guards were posted at the few shops that still sold groceries, and purchases were regulated by ration cards.