we didnt hate the ussr, we thought we saw the endgame how it will all crumble one day, some of that was correct
Why did nonrussians in the USSR hate the soviets?
Yes but I think the fact he did afterwards might have colored Western perceptions of these ethnic minorities' political "reliability," when in reality a lot of them were just trying to survive in the midst of a catastrophe
Literally on wikipedia and I've had similar rhetoric repeated to me in discussions on the USSR (i.e. "The USSR was so bad, the X country even welcomed the Nazis!")
To quote the wiki:
It's also worth noting that the Balts had been previously independent an integrated into the USSR by force only a couple years earlier.
That which can be asserted without evidence…
Im talking about ethnicities which were in the USSR from the start.
2+2=4 can be asserted without evidence
Also worth noting that that any country going through sovietization is going to go through some initial upsets given that countries like Lithuania, prior to occupation, had a right-wing nationalist government and a capitalist economy. When you begin the process of removing those in the government and start the change over to a socialist economic model, you're going to have plenty of people, either it be business owners, nationalists, capitalist sympathizers, or loyalists to the previous government, who will not be happy with such changes. The soviets also had relatively very little time to stabilize things and secure the country before the Germans arrived, you can't develop socialism in a previously capitalist country in less then a year. So yes, there were most likely Balts who happened to welcome the Germans into their country, but it was not out of fascist sympathy itself (though the previous government did have them) and was more more likely due to the fact that the Soviets had relatively just arrived and many who did not wish for any sort of change believed the Germans would set things "right". We don't know how things might have developed if the Germans had not moved into the Baltics and the Soviets were given more time to stabilize things, but given the example of other SSRs, they would have most likely had the country going and the reactionary element suppressed in a few years or so.
Also, on the topic of the apparent war crimes committed in countries like Lithuania by the USSR, the source for them is extremely suspect given that its a "newly released doc" (as in, this year) from a Lithuanian "Genocide" documentation site and is allegedly written by an NKGB operative. Some of claims are farcical to say the least. kgbveikla.lt
Also, to answer your question on those volunteer divisions, they were all relatively very small. As in, as much as you would expect for divisions created out of the reactionary portion of the already small population of those groups who lived in the western part of Europe or just outside of the USSR. The Georgian Legion for example was created by combing through such emigre populations and yet still had to be bolstered by captured Georgian POWs to make a significant enough force. The actions of a few do not reflect on the whole however, and you had ethnic groups, which one making sweeping generalizations would assume would fight for the axis based on their ancestry, fight instead for the allies (Allied Germans, Japanese, etc.). To add, you had Nationalists and Soviets of every ethnicity, but usually always more soviets. Even the Chechens only had about 5,000 guerillas to begin with.
Im not talking about volunteer divisions only, but about general anti-soviet sentiment in populations such as belarussians and tatars. Apparently Belarussians and Ukrainian civilians gifted germans salt and bread when they came.
Crimean tatars massively allied with the germans for not apparent reason.
Anyway thanks for the info.
Do you have any knowledge on how easy it was for Germans to recruit Kalmyks and Volga tatars?
Also is it true that Chechens massively deserted when in the Soviet Army?