The fate of the flotsam of war

The violent handover of "Cossacks and Yugoslav non-Communists" to the forces of Stalin and Tito in 1945 remains controversial. A libel action against Count Nikolai Tolstoy clarified some aspects. But to Robert Harris, in his foreword to Ian Mitchell's cool, carefully researched book, parts of the trial read like "Bleak House re-written by Alexander Solzhenitsyn". Many, but not all, of the Cossacks in German uniforms could be considered traitors to their hugely damaged but victorious country. A secret part of the Yalta Agreement covered the hand-back of nationals. Force was not mentioned; the assumption was that prisoners wanted to go home.

Many non-Soviet nationals were illegally handed over. An unsuccessful, unnecessary cover-up followed. Unsuccessful, because Solzhenitsyn, a "writer of record", described dying survivors in his Gulag Archipelago (1974). Unnecessary, because mistakes could have been admitted. Mitchell explains the chaotic situation in southern Austria. For some reason the Cossacks and Yugoslavs were not allowed to go to accommodation offered in another Allied area. Secret files were being released under the thirty-year rule. Some Gulag survivors could talk. More importantly, by 1974, ex-British servicemen were willing to talk.

Books by Nicholas Bethell and Nikolai Tolstoy contain grim passages. British officers described how their troops, using clubs, pick-handles, rifle-butts and bayonets, beat men, women and children into trucks and trains. Deaths and serious injuries ensued. Many regiments were involved. Commanding Officers (COs) complied with orders, but protested later. Nationality screening, done in one Corps, was ignored in another. Maj Davies, of the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders, gave particularly detailed accounts. Apart from deaths in the beating, there were suicides. Mothers with babies jumped into rivers. Lieut. R. Shields, of the Inniskilling Fusiliers, described similar scenes. His CO, Lieut-Col. David Shaw, told Bethell (see The Last Secret) of protesting to Gen. Arbuthnott, the Division Commander. "He was amazed to be told that his battalion had been specially picked for the dirty job because they were Irish. The general said he had taken the view that the Irish would be less likely to object or make trouble than an English battalion." Shaw was shocked and insulted. "Gen. Arbuthnott gave me a direct order and I had to carry it out. The men moaned like anything but in the end they obeyed orders too. It was terrible. I remember these women - some of them pregnant - lying on the ground rolling and screaming . . ."

The London Irish Rifles, "a seasoned, hardened regiment", mount ed early train escorts into Soviet territory. The men saw murders and suicides. Some say that Arbuthnott protested against superior orders. But Mitchell quotes War Office file and paragraph numbers of an order issued by Arbuthnott. "Included in those to be forcibly handed over [are] lying sick and expectant mothers" . This was not in his superior orders.

Mitchell briefly drops his cool and compares Arbuthnott with the Nazis. Whatever about that, it does seem that the order was not a lawful one. If so, the soldier's "unthinkable" dilemma becomes reality; was it lawful to obey it?

Ultimately, the Tolstoy libel action concerned responsibility for the hand-over of Yugoslavs and non-Soviet citizens - and the use of force forbidden by Field-Marshal Alexander. Mitchell's culprit is Lieut-Gen. Keightley, Arbuthnott's superior. Both are dead; documents have disappeared. But copies were found in American files.

The Establishment and its bureaucracy defeated Tolstoy. By clear tabulations which even that bureaucracy must admire, Mitchell proves that files withheld from Tolstoy were made available to his opponent.

E.D. Doyle is a former Army officer