About scope partisan movement evidenced by a number of major operations carried out jointly with the Red Army. One of them was called “Rail War”. It was carried out in August-September 1943 on the enemy-occupied territory of the RSFSR, Belarusian and part Ukrainian SSR with the aim of disabling the railway communications of the German- fascist troops. This operation was connected with the plans of the Headquarters to complete the defeat of the Nazis on the Kursk Bulge, conduct the Smolensk operation and an offensive to liberate Left Bank Ukraine. The TsShPD also attracted Leningrad, Smolensk, and Oryol partisans to carry out the operation.

The order for Operation Rail War was given on June 14, 1943. Local partisan headquarters and their representatives at the fronts assigned areas and objects of action to each partisan formation. The partisans were supplied with " Mainland» explosives, fuses, reconnaissance was actively carried out on enemy railway communications. The operation began on the night of August 3 and continued until mid-September. The fighting behind enemy lines took place over an area of ​​about 1,000 km along the front and 750 km in depth; about 100 thousand partisans took part in them with the active support of the local population.

A powerful blow to the railways in territory occupied by the enemy came as a complete surprise to him. For a long time, the Nazis were unable to counteract the partisans in an organized manner. During Operation Rail War, over 215 thousand railway rails were blown up, many trains with personnel and Nazi military equipment, railway bridges and station buildings were blown up. The railway capacity decreased by 35-40%, which thwarted the Nazis' plans to accumulate material resources and concentrate troops, and seriously hampered the regrouping of enemy forces.

For the same purposes, but during the upcoming offensive Soviet troops in the Smolensk, Gomel directions and the battle for the Dnieper, the partisan operation codenamed “Concert” was subordinated. It was carried out from September 19 to November 1, 1943 on the fascist-occupied territory of Belarus Karelia, in the Leningrad and Kalinin regions, in the territory of Latvia, Estonia, Crimea, covering a front of about 900 km and a depth of over 400 km.

It was a planned continuation of Operation Rail War; it was closely connected with the upcoming offensive of Soviet troops in the Smolensk and Gomel directions and during the Battle of the Dnieper. 193 partisan detachments (groups) from Belarus, the Baltic states, Karelia, Crimea, Leningrad and Kalinin regions (over 120 thousand people) were involved in the operation, which were supposed to undermine more than 272 thousand rails.

On the territory of Belarus, more than 90 thousand partisans took part in the operation; they had to blow up 140 thousand rails. The Central Headquarters of the Partisan Movement intended to throw 120 tons of explosives and other cargo to the Belarusian partisans, and 20 tons to the Kaliningrad and Leningrad partisans.

Due to the sharp deterioration of weather conditions, by the start of the operation it was possible to transfer only about half of the planned amount of cargo to the partisans, so it was decided to begin mass sabotage on September 25. However, some of the detachments that had already reached the initial lines could not take into account the changes in the timing of the operation and began to implement it on September 19. On the night of September 25, simultaneous actions were carried out according to the plan of Operation Concert on a front of about 900 km (excluding Karelia and Crimea) and in a depth of over 400 km.

Local headquarters of the partisan movement and their representation at the fronts assigned areas and objects of action to each partisan formation. The partisans were provided with explosives and fuses, mine-explosive classes were held at “forest courses”, metal from captured shells and bombs was mined at local “factories”, and fastenings for metal bombs to rails were made in workshops and forges. Reconnaissance was actively carried out on the railways. The operation began on the night of August 3 and continued until mid-September. The actions took place on an area with a length of about 1000 km along the front and 750 km in depth, about 100 thousand partisans took part in them, who were helped by the local population. Powerful blow to the railway. lines was unexpected for the enemy, who for some time could not counteract the partisans in an organized manner. During the operation, about 215 thousand rails were blown up, many trains were derailed, railway bridges and station buildings were blown up. The massive disruption of enemy communications significantly complicated the regrouping of retreating enemy troops, complicated their supply, and thereby contributed to the successful offensive of the Red Army.

The objective of Operation Concert was to disable large sections of railway lines in order to disrupt enemy transport. The bulk of the partisan formations began fighting on the night of September 25, 1943. During Operation Concert, Belarusian partisans alone blew up about 90 thousand rails, derailed 1041 enemy trains, destroyed 72 railway bridges, and defeated 58 invader garrisons. Operation Concert caused serious difficulties in the transportation of Nazi troops. Railway capacity has decreased by more than three times. This made it very difficult Hitler's command maneuver of its forces and provided enormous assistance to the advancing Red Army troops.

It is impossible to list here all the partisan heroes whose contribution to the victory over the enemy was so noticeable in the common struggle of the Soviet people over the Nazi invaders. During the war, wonderful partisan command cadres grew up - S.A. Kovpak, A.F. Fedorov, A.N. Saburov, V.A. Begma, N.N. Popudrenko and many others. In terms of its scale, political and military results, the nationwide struggle of the Soviet people in the territories occupied by Hitler's troops acquired the significance of an important military-political factor in the defeat of fascism. The selfless activities of partisans and underground fighters received national recognition and highly appreciated states. More than 300 thousand partisans and underground fighters were awarded orders and medals, including over 127 thousand - the medal “Partisan of the Great Patriotic War» 1st and 2nd degrees, 248 awarded the high title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

The year 1943 went down in the history of partisan warfare as the year of massive attacks on the railway communications of the Nazi troops. The partisans actively participated in major operations on enemy communications - “Rail War” and “Concert”. “Concert” is the conventional name of the operation carried out during the Great Patriotic War by Soviet partisans from September 19 to the end of October 1943.

The positive results of Operation Rail War provided the basis for the development of subsequent operations of a similar type. At the beginning of September 1943, the Chief (TsShPD) at the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command approved the Operation Plan for the destruction of enemy railways (Operation “Concert”). Each partisan formation received a specific combat mission, which included blowing up rails, organizing the collapse of enemy military trains, destroying road structures, disabling communications, water supply systems, etc. Detailed combat plans were developed and mass training partisans carrying out demolition work.

Head of the Central Headquarters of the Partisan Movement at the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command lieutenant general PC. Ponomarenko

The purpose of the operation is the massive disabling of large sections of railways in the rear eastern front fascist German troops from Karelia to Crimea to complicate the operational transportation of troops, military equipment and other material assets of the enemy. As a continuation of Operation Rail War, Operation Concert was carried out under the leadership of the TsShPD and was closely connected with the upcoming offensive of Soviet troops in the Smolensk and Gomel directions and during the Battle of the Dnieper. 193 partisan formations from Belarus, the Baltic states, Karelia, Crimea, Leningrad, Kalinin, Smolensk and Oryol region with a total number of 120,615 people, who were supposed to undermine more than 272 thousand rails. On the territory of Belarus, about 92 thousand partisans took part in the operation; they had to blow up 140 thousand rails. The central headquarters of the partisan movement planned to throw 120 tons of explosives and other cargo to the Belarusian partisans, and 20 tons to the Kalinin and Leningrad partisans.

Due to the sharp deterioration of weather conditions, by the start of the operation it was possible to transfer only about half of the planned amount of cargo to the partisans, so it was decided to begin mass sabotage on September 25. However, some of the detachments that had already reached their starting lines could not take into account the changes in the timing of the operation, and on the night of September 19, when the Red Army, liberating the Oryol, Smolensk regions and Left Bank Ukraine, was approaching the Dnieper, it began to implement it. The partisans of Belarus alone blew up 19,903 rails on the night of September 19.

Partisans of the “People's Avenger” detachment of the Temkinsky district are mining the railway track. Smolensk region. September 1943

Already at 6 o'clock in the morning of this date, the directorate of the German State Railways in Minsk reported with alarm: “The situation is very tense! The partisan activities are increasing unbearably. All junction stations are overcrowded due to the impossibility of using the lines...”

The bulk of the partisan formations began fighting on the night of September 25. Having defeated the enemy guards and captured the railway tracks, they began massive destruction and mining of the railway track. Simultaneous actions were carried out according to the Operation Concert plan at a front of about 900 km (excluding Karelia and Crimea) and in depth over 400 km. On the territory of Belarus alone, another 15,809 rails were blown up that night.

The fascist German command made desperate efforts to restore traffic on the railways. The Nazis hastily transferred new railway restoration battalions from Germany and even from the front line, and the local population was rounded up for repair work.

Guerrillas are preparing to mine the railway track

Sabotage on the railways continued in October. In total, over 148,500 rails were undermined. At this point, Operation Concert was effectively terminated due to lack of supplies of explosives. Despite the fact that the objectives of the operation were not fully accomplished, its results were significant. The roads that were located not only in the east of the occupied territory, as was the case in the “Rail War,” were subjected to massive attacks, but also in the west of Belarus, in the Baltic states and Karelia.

Results guerrilla operations they were very effective in massively undermining rails. During the first two operations alone (“Rail War” and “Concert”) from July 22 to October 1943, partisans on the railways behind enemy lines blew up 363,262 rails, which corresponded to 2,270 km of single-track railway track. Especially many rails were destroyed in such sections as Luninets - Kalinkovichi (41,781), Pskov - Dno (23,887), Polotsk - Molodechno (21,243), Leningrad - Pskov (17,659), Mogilev - Zhlobin (15,074), Krichev - Unecha (12,204), Orsha - Minsk (7982), Bryansk - Unecha (7031). The Nazis tried to make up for the shortage of rails by converting double-track sections of the track into single-track ones, welding broken rails, and even importing them from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Germany. However, the partisans again disabled the repaired areas. This further increased the tension in the work of the enemy’s railway transport. According to Colonel A.I. Bryukhanov, head of the operations department of the Belarusian headquarters of the partisan movement, in August alone, 5 thousand two-axle platforms and hundreds of locomotives were used for this purpose.

According to military experts, the actions of the partisans in the “Rail War” and “Concert” operations were more than 11 times more effective than all the raids of the Nazi aviation, which dropped on approximately the same period railways there are more than 10 thousand aerial bombs in the Soviet rear.

Moreover, the result of partisan operations such as “Rail War” and “Concert” was not only a huge number of broken rails. They included a large complex of sabotage actions on all enemy communications - railway, road, water and air, supported by attacks on garrisons and other important objects in the enemy rear.

Simultaneously with the detonation of the rails, the partisans derailed trains, destroyed bridges, railway stations, and disabled other elements of the track facilities. During the same period, as a result of the actions of Ukrainian and Moldavian partisans, hundreds of enemy military trains crashed. The capacity of the enemy's railways in the occupied territory of the USSR in September-October 1943, as a result of the actions of the partisans, decreased significantly. According to some estimates, it decreased by 35-40%, which significantly complicated the regrouping of fascist troops and provided great assistance to the advancing Red Army.

Ultimately, the transportation of Wehrmacht units and formations by rail, as well as transportation and evacuation, were significantly difficult. Operation Concert intensified the struggle of the Soviet people against Nazi invaders in the occupied territory. During the war, the influx of local population into partisan formations increased.

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Guerrilla operation "Concert"

The year 1943 went down in the history of partisan warfare as the year of massive attacks on the railway communications of the Nazi troops. The partisans actively participated in major operations on enemy communications - “Rail War” and “Concert”. “Concert” is the conventional name of the operation carried out during the Great Patriotic War by Soviet partisans from September 19 to the end of October 1943.

The positive results of Operation Rail War provided the basis for the development of subsequent operations of a similar type. At the beginning of September 1943, the Chief (TsShPD) at the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command approved the Operation Plan for the destruction of enemy railways (Operation “Concert”). Each partisan formation received a specific combat mission, which included blowing up rails, organizing the collapse of enemy military trains, destroying road structures, disabling communications, water supply systems, etc. Detailed combat plans were developed and mass training of partisans in demolition work was organized.

Head of the Central Headquarters of the Partisan Movement at the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command lieutenant general PC. Ponomarenko

The purpose of the operation was to massively disable large sections of railways in the rear of the eastern front of the Nazi troops from Karelia to the Crimea and to complicate the operational transportation of troops, military equipment and other material assets of the enemy. As a continuation of Operation Rail War, Operation Concert was carried out under the leadership of the TsShPD and was closely connected with the upcoming offensive of Soviet troops in the Smolensk and Gomel directions and during the Battle of the Dnieper. 193 partisan formations from Belarus, the Baltic states, Karelia, Crimea, Leningrad, Kalinin, Smolensk and Oryol regions with a total number of 120,615 people were involved in the operation, which were supposed to undermine more than 272 thousand rails. On the territory of Belarus, about 92 thousand partisans took part in the operation; they had to blow up 140 thousand rails. The central headquarters of the partisan movement planned to throw 120 tons of explosives and other cargo to the Belarusian partisans, and 20 tons to the Kalinin and Leningrad partisans.

Due to the sharp deterioration of weather conditions, by the start of the operation it was possible to transfer only about half of the planned amount of cargo to the partisans, so it was decided to begin mass sabotage on September 25. However, some of the detachments that had already reached their starting lines could not take into account the changes in the timing of the operation, and on the night of September 19, when the Red Army, liberating the Oryol, Smolensk regions and Left Bank Ukraine, was approaching the Dnieper, it began to implement it. The partisans of Belarus alone blew up 19,903 rails on the night of September 19.

Partisans of the “People's Avenger” detachment of the Temkinsky district are mining the railway track. Smolensk region. September 1943

Already at 6 o'clock in the morning of this date, the directorate of the German State Railways in Minsk reported with alarm: “The situation is very tense! The partisan activities are increasing unbearably. All junction stations are overcrowded due to the impossibility of using the lines...”

The bulk of the partisan formations began fighting on the night of September 25. Having defeated the enemy guards and captured the railway tracks, they began massive destruction and mining of the railway track. Simultaneous actions were carried out according to the Operation Concert plan at a front of about 900 km (excluding Karelia and Crimea) and in depth over 400 km. On the territory of Belarus alone, another 15,809 rails were blown up that night.

The fascist German command made desperate efforts to restore traffic on the railways. The Nazis hastily transferred new railway restoration battalions from Germany and even from the front line, and the local population was rounded up for repair work.

Guerrillas are preparing to mine the railway track

Sabotage on the railways continued in October. In total, over 148,500 rails were undermined. At this point, Operation Concert was effectively terminated due to lack of supplies of explosives. Despite the fact that the objectives of the operation were not fully accomplished, its results were significant. The roads that were located not only in the east of the occupied territory, as was the case in the “Rail War,” were subjected to massive attacks, but also in the west of Belarus, in the Baltic states and Karelia.

The results of partisan operations to massively undermine rails were very effective. During the first two operations alone (“Rail War” and “Concert”) from July 22 to October 1943, partisans on the railways behind enemy lines blew up 363,262 rails, which corresponded to 2,270 km of single-track railway track. Especially many rails were destroyed in such sections as Luninets - Kalinkovichi (41,781), Pskov - Dno (23,887), Polotsk - Molodechno (21,243), Leningrad - Pskov (17,659), Mogilev - Zhlobin (15,074), Krichev - Unecha (12,204), Orsha - Minsk (7982), Bryansk - Unecha (7031). The Nazis tried to make up for the shortage of rails by converting double-track sections of the track into single-track ones, welding broken rails, and even importing them from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Germany. However, the partisans again disabled the repaired areas. This further increased the tension in the work of the enemy’s railway transport. According to Colonel A.I. Bryukhanov, head of the operations department of the Belarusian headquarters of the partisan movement, in August alone, 5 thousand two-axle platforms and hundreds of locomotives were used for this purpose.

According to military experts, the actions of the partisans in the “Rail War” and “Concert” operations were more than 11 times more effective than all the raids of the Nazi aviation, which dropped more than 10 thousand aerial bombs on the railways in the Soviet rear during approximately the same period. .

Moreover, the result of partisan operations such as “Rail War” and “Concert” was not only a huge number of broken rails. They included a large complex of sabotage actions on all enemy communications - railway, road, water and air, supported by attacks on garrisons and other important objects in the enemy rear.

Simultaneously with the detonation of the rails, the partisans derailed trains, destroyed bridges, railway stations, and disabled other elements of the track facilities. During the same period, as a result of the actions of Ukrainian and Moldavian partisans, hundreds of enemy military trains crashed. The capacity of the enemy's railways in the occupied territory of the USSR in September-October 1943, as a result of the actions of the partisans, decreased significantly. According to some estimates, it decreased by 35-40%, which significantly complicated the regrouping of fascist troops and provided great assistance to the advancing Red Army.

Ultimately, the transportation of Wehrmacht units and formations by rail, as well as transportation and evacuation, were significantly difficult. Operation Concert intensified the struggle of the Soviet people against the Nazi invaders in the occupied territory. During the war, the influx of local population into partisan formations increased.

"Rail War", as the most important contribution Soviet partisans in the cause of common Victory are taught today in Russian and Belarusian schools. But the plan initially contained an error that could have derailed the entire strategy.

The Belarusian partisans corrected the mistake in time thanks to only one person

Allied saboteur

Ilya Grigorievich Starinov at the age of 18 he took up arms and went to defend the revolution. After civilian life, he completed his first military specialty, acquired under the leadership of a colonel royal service and the red brigade commander, Vasily Ivanovich Solodukhin, becomes a military expert on the “D line” of the partisan-sabotage service of the Red Army in a secret school Kochegarova, in Kyiv.

At the age of 34, he was appointed to the most responsible sector of ensuring state security of the USSR of that period: to the military commandant’s office of the Moscow railway station in Leningrad, where after the murder of a comrade Kirov special trains from the capital were constantly arriving. At 36, he put his combat skills into practice for the first time, derailing a trainload of Italian pilots and their staff. And in 37 he destroyed a group of Moroccan soldiers, “regulares”. The experience gained along the “D Line” and during the Spanish mission made Captain Starinov one of the best saboteurs in the USSR and the world. Ilya Grigorievich knew this; any day now he expected a call to Moscow for a promotion. And the challenge came.

The closer to Caesar, the stronger the fear

While Ilya Starinov was gaining experience in sabotage in the battles of Zaragoza, Madrid and Barcelona, ​​comrade Stalin in the Kremlin he studied the scheme of the fascist rebellion of Spanish generals. The knowledge gained impressed the leader so much that he took a closer look at his own military. AND Soviet people I learned something terrible from newspapers and radio stations: legendary heroes civil war, marshals of the Red Army, personal friends of Comrade Stalin turned out to be traitors preparing a fascist rebellion in the country of the Soviets. At the head of these agents of England, America, Germany, Italy and Japan was a marshal Tukhachevsky.

The bodies of the NKVD and iron people's commissar, comrade Yezhov. The conspirators' communication channels extended to Spain, where immediately after the exposure of Tukhachevsky, a Trotskyist-fascist rebellion broke out in Barcelona. The new republican government of comrade managed to suppress it Juana Negrina, but the NKVD had to recall Soviet volunteers to their homeland for inspection. So the call to Moscow for Ilya Grigorievich was not at all for a promotion.

Captain Starinov was “filtered” for almost a year while he held the position of chief training ground NKPS. And all his Spanish fellow soldiers, starting with the brigade commissar Christopher Intovich Salnyn, to whom Starinov, while leaving for Moscow, handed over the cases, before acting. Chief of the GRU of the Red Army, senior major Semyon Grigorievich Gnedin— shot. Ilya Grigorievich was carefully preserved for the future “big deal” by the God of War. He avoided suspicion, but the party placed high trust in him, allowing him to prove his dedication to the Lenin-Stalin cause with blood.

From the “White Finnish” to the “Rail” War

Captain Starinov is sent from a command post as a simple commander of a sabotage and barrage group to the Leningrad Military District, to the “White Finnish” war. With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, he fought on the Western and Southwestern fronts. And only after the destruction of the generals Weinecker And von Braun Starinov promoted to deputy chief engineering troops USSR. And in 1942 he was appointed deputy chief of staff of the partisan movement, general Ponomarenko.

In the summer of 1943, on the eve of Battle of Kursk, Starinov’s ideas, all his experience finally turned out to be in demand. However, some adjustments were made, which, as Ilya Grigorievich later noted in his memoirs, he perceived negatively. Thus, in the course of organizing sabotage on the railway tracks, it was decided to focus on destroying the rails, while Starinov himself believed that first of all, enemy trains should be derailed and bridges blown up.

In June 1943, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Belarus adopted a resolution “On the destruction of enemy railway communications using the method of rail warfare.” The document proposed inflicting a massive sabotage strike on the enemy. On July 14, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command decided to conduct Operation Rail War, and on August 3, the Central Headquarters of the partisan movement began to implement it. 167 partisan brigades and separate units with a total number of about 100,000 fighters. It was carried out on the territory of the BSSR, Ukrainian SSR and RSFSR.

Tactical miscalculation

Order 0042 of July 14, 1943 ordered the destruction of the rails. Is there anything strange here if the war is on rails? But the devil was in the details. The headquarters proceeded from the erroneous belief that the Germans lacked rails. Therefore, destroying the canvas seemed to be the simplest and most accessible method of war. But the reconnaissance miscalculated: the enemy had a surplus of rails. The Germans welded them at night and replaced them during the day, and then they came up with an 80-centimeter “bridge” and began running trains across it. After all, when a standard “checker” exploded, only 25-40 cm of the path was knocked out.

The "rail war" did not produce the desired results. Traffic on the enemy's railways was completely blocked only in the rear of Army Group Center, and even then for only three days, from August 3 to 6, 1943. A very unpleasant surprise was that the switch of the partisans' main efforts to blowing up rails due to a lack of explosives led to to reduce train crashes. And this led to the opposite of the set goals: the capacity of railways in enemy territory only increased.

Starinov's finest hour - Operation Concert

The partisans used about 50 tons of explosives to blow up the rails in August and the first half of September. This would be enough to derail 1,500 trains. It was this argument that Ilya Starinov presented to Panteleimon Ponomarenko, citing experience in Spain. Although some partisan commanders understood this on the spot. Therefore, they began to reduce rail explosions, while simultaneously increasing the number of train derailments.

The second stage of Operation Rail War was planned under the leadership of Starinov and was called “Concert”. 193 partisan units, numbering about 120,000 fighters, took part in it. The Rail Concert began on September 25. It covered almost all western front, with the exception of Karelia and Crimea. The partisans sought to provide Soviet troops with the conditions for an attack on Kyiv. In Belarus they derailed over a thousand trains. Only by winter the crushing blow from the rear on the enemy was stopped by the command: the reserves of explosives had dried up. But Kyiv was liberated.

Partisan argument

The "Rail War" is today the first and only guerrilla war strategic operation on the scale of several fronts. Nothing like this has ever been carried out by any army in the world, or in any war. The Soviet record is also more convincing because the partisans’ actions were not scattered. It was a strictly centralized operation of vertical subordination, similar to a front-line operation, only behind enemy lines. The incredible success was ensured not so much by the genius of the command as by the ideal organization of the matter.

The successful execution of Operation Rail War by partisan units provided the basis for the development of subsequent campaigns based on a similar scenario. At the beginning of September 1943, the Central Headquarters of the partisan movement began developing and preparing for a new massive attack on rear communications German troops in the occupied territories under the code name "Concert".

The main task assigned to the partisans was to cause maximum damage to the German transport infrastructure, which in turn was supposed to reduce the operational mobility of the Reich troops. Operation Concert was closely connected with the offensive of Soviet troops in the Smolensk and Gomel directions, as well as the Red Army's access to the banks of the Dnieper and Desna rivers. The partisans had to strike over a vast territory: along a front of about 700 km and in depth over 400 km, covering the territory of Belarus, Ukraine, the Baltic states, as well as the Leningrad and Smolensk regions. It was planned to involve over 200 partisan formations in the operation, with a total number of about 150 thousand people.

In preparation for the operation, not only were the action plans of each unit carefully developed, but also the fighters of the partisan detachments were fully trained in subversive activities. For example, on the territory controlled by the Chernigov-Volyn partisan unit, an entire training ground was built for training purposes, which was a 300-meter section of the railway, equipped with all possible defensive structures. At this training ground, demolitionists and miners, machine gunners and mortar men honed their skills around the clock. Over time, many fighters became virtuosos of sabotage work.

Along with the railway infrastructure, highways, airfields, fuel and ammunition warehouses were targets for sabotage. The partisans also had to paralyze the movement of enemy vehicles. Roads have become no less dangerous for the enemy.

In preparation for the operation, Soviet aviation began dropping weapons and explosives for the partisan brigades. The start date of the “Concert” was September 19, 1943 - It was by this time that the advanced units of the Red Army were supposed to reach the Dnieper, Pripyat and Desna rivers and begin crossing them. However, the weather interfered with the plans of the Central Headquarters. Difficult meteorological conditions did not allow the partisans to deliver everything they needed on time. It was decided to postpone the start of the operation to September 25.

The actions of the partisans should not have been limited exclusively to sabotage. Ukrainian detachments, especially those operating between the Desna and Dnieper, were tasked with capturing and holding crossings and bridgeheads on the banks of the rivers. For these purposes, artillery and combat crews were dropped into the partisan units.

Guerrilla sabotage, both on railways and highways, was supposed to paralyze the preparations for a counter-offensive of Nazi troops in the Dnieper region.

The Partisans of Belarus operated here

In the rear of the German invaders, in the occupied regions of Belarus, the people's avengers - Belarusian partisans - are bravely fighting the enemy, helping the advancing Red Army. Partisans were especially active in Polesie. They set themselves the goal of destroying enemy communications. No matter how the Germans guarded the railways, no matter what measures they took to fight the partisans, it was all in vain! Railway bridges, tracks, trains were blown up, traffic on the roads was constantly suspended.
Now that the Red Army has liberated a number of regions of Belarus from German invaders, we have seen with our own eyes the traces of the heroic struggle of the people's avengers against the Nazis. Before you are a series of photographic documents showing the combat work of the Polesie partisans: blown up tracks, derailed trains, broken telephone and telegraph lines.