SOVIET ARMED STRENGTH IN GERMANY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27572, 14 December 1950, Page 7

SOVIET ARMED STRENGTH IN GERMANY

Western Allies Outnumbered By Three To One

New Zealand Press Association Special Correspondent

Rec. 8 p.m. 4 LONDON, Dec. 13. According to the best estimates available, about 320,000 Russian soldiers of various kinds are occupying Eastern Germany, says the Berlin correspondent of the Manchester Guardian. Most of the Russians are stationed in the western and south-western parts of the Soviet zone between Berlin and the American zones.

It is impossible to determine the exact operational strength of the six separate armies into which these troops are said to be divided. At the moment their forces in Germany probably outnumber those of the Western Allies by at least three to one.

Most of, the operational troops are stationed between the River Elbe and the frontiers of Czechoslovakia, Bavaria and Hesse, or along the Baltic coast. Each of the six armies is said to consist of four, five or six divisions. A few of them are armoured, and several others have now been “motorised”— which means that they are probably as mobile as a British infantry division. The Russians have withdrawn to their new winter quarters, most of which have been established along the Elbe in Thuringia and in SaxonyAnalt. Their essential supplies have been or are being replenished, but there is thought to be no reason to suppose that they intend to leave their present billets before the spring. All that can be said with confidence about the strength of the Soviet air forces in Germany is that they occupy most of the military airfields in the Soviet zone. It is known, however, that their equipment includes several squadrons of jet-propelled fighters, as well as numerous piston-engined aircraft of the same type. Heavy bombers have seldom been seen flying over Eastern Germany. Some medium transport squadrons seem to be based on the airfields near Berlin.

detachments ” of the East German People’s Police. Unlike the rest of the People’s Police, whose total strength is 170,000, the " alert detachments ” are not controlled by the Ministry of the Interior, but by Herr Walter Ulbricht, the Communist Deputy Premier in the East German Government, and by a special section of the Soviet Control Commission. Although most of them have now been trained for nearly two years in the use of light automatic weapons (and a few have been taught to use tanks and light artillery), it is clear that the Russians either despise or mistrust them. The only German units which have yet been incorporated in the Soviet defence system are maritime police detachments of the “ See Polizei.” These detachments, whose total strength is about 10,000 men, are nominally controlled by a special department of the East German Ministry of the Interior. There is good reason to believe that the association between the maritime police and the Russian Navy are much closer than the association between the “ alert detachments ” and the Russian Army. Most of the maritime police are based in Rostock and have been given a few lightly-armed patrol boats which they use to protect the territorial waters of the East German Republic.

About 50,000 Germans have now been enrolled in semi-military “alert