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“The Germans started a form of blackmail against the surviving Russian war prisoners,” war correspondent Alexander Werth notes. “[E]ither go into the Vlasov Army or starve.” The overwhelming majority of Soviet POWs refused the offer, and about 2 million POWs who were given the choice of collaboration or starvation between 1942 and 1945 chose death before they would aid the [Axis]. But many thousands of Russians did join the invaders as porters, cooks, concentration camp guards, and informers, and later as fighting troops under [Axis] control.⁷
I wonder if this is the actual origin of that story that Soviets would kill themselves rather than be taken prisoners by the Nazis because they ‘knew’ that if they were ever released back to the Soviets that they would be allegedly tortured and killed for Nazi collaboration.
Proton Drive is working well for me so far.