Operation Keelhaul was a programme carried out in Austria by British forces in May and June 1945 that decided the fate of thousands of post-war refugees fleeing eastern Europe. 1945 (MCMXLV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... Combatants Allied Powers Axis Powers Commanders {{{commander1}}} {{{commander2}}} Strength {{{strength1}}} {{{strength2}}} Casualties 17 million military deaths 8 million military deaths {{{notes}}} World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a military conflict that took place between 1939 and 1945. ...

One of the conclusions of the Yalta Conference was that the Allies would return all Soviet citizens that found themselves in the Allied zone to the Soviet Union. This immediately affected the Soviet prisoners of war liberated by the Allies, but was also extended to all other persons. The Yalta Conference, sometimes called the Crimea Conference and codenamed the Argonaut Conference, was the wartime meeting from February 4 to 11, 1945 between the heads of government of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union. ... Geneva Convention definition A prisoner of war (POW) is a soldier, sailor, airman, or marine who is imprisoned by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict. ...

The refugee columns fleeing the Soviet-occupied eastern Europe numbered tens of thousands of people. They included assorted fascists, Nazi collaborationists, anti-communists and civilians, both from the Soviet Union and from Yugoslavia. The group included around 70,000 Cossacks from the Soviet Union and Ustaše from Yugoslavia including about 11,000 women and children. Fascism (in Italian, fascismo), capitalized, was the authoritarian political movement which ruled Italy from 1922 to 1943 under the leadership of Benito Mussolini. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Nazism. ... Collaboration, literally, consists of working together with one or more other people. ... Anti-communism is opposition to communist ideology, organization, or government, on either a theoretical or practical level. ... A civilian is a person who is not a member of a military. ... Yugoslavia (Jugoslavija in all south Slavic languages, in Macedonian and Serbian Cyrillic Југославија) is a term used for three separate but successive political entities that existed during most of the 20th century on the Balkan Peninsula in Europe. ... This article needs cleanup. ... The Ustaše (often spelled Ustashe in English; singular Ustaša or Ustasha) was a Croatian far-right organisation put in charge of the Independent State of Croatia by the Axis Powers in 1941. ...

They were rounded up in Austria and forcibly repatriated. Most were headed for the Soviet zone of Germany in the east, or for Slovenia in the south. Many of the refugees were summarily executed (as revenge for the crimes committed by fascists during the war), sometimes within earshot of the British. The killings at the hand of the Yugoslav forces are known as the Bleiburg massacre. State motto (Russian): Пролетарии всех стран, соединяйтесь! (Transliterated: Proletarii vsekh stran, soedinyaytes!) (Translated: Workers of the world, unite!) Capital Moscow Official language None; Russian (de facto) Government Federation of Socialist republics Area  - Total  - % water 1st before collapse 22,402,200 km² Approx. ... The Bleiburg massacre occurred near to the end of World War II, during May 1945. ...

Among those handed over were White Russians who had never been Soviet citizens including the General Andrei Shkuro and the Ataman of the Don Cossack Host Pyotr Krasnov despite the British Foreign Office policy stated after the Yalta Conference that only Soviet citizens, after September 1, 1939, were to be compelled to return to the USSR. White Army armoured trains flag with To Moscow! slogan inscribed on it, now stored in the Moscow Red Army museum The White movement, whose military arm is known as the White Army (Белая Армия) or White Guard (Белая Гвардия, белогвардейцы) and whose members are known as Whites (Белые, or the derogatory Беляки) or White Russians (a... Andrei Shkuro Andrei Grigoriyevich Shkuro (Shkura) (Андрей Григорьевич Шкуро (Шкура) in Russian) (January 19, 1887 (O.S.: January 7) – January 17, 1947) was a Lieutenant General (1919) of the White movement. ... Ataman (variants: wataman, vataman, otaman, Cyrillic: атаман (Russian), ватаман (Russian, regional), отаман (Ukrainian)) was a title of Cossack and haidamak leaders of various kinds. ... The term Don may refer to; Don, Donald Ducks nickname. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with History of the Cossacks. ... Ataman Pyotr Krasnov Pyotr Nikolayevich Krasnov (Петр Николаевич Краснов in Russian) (September 22 (10 O.S.), 1869 — January 17, 1947), sometimes referred to in English as Peter Krasnov, was Lieutenant General of the Russian army when the revolution broke out in 1917, and one of the leaders of the counterrevolutionary White movement afterwards. ... September 1 is the 244th day of the year (245th in leap years). ... 1939 (MCMXXXIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ...

Alexander Solzhenitsyn called this operation "the last secret of World War II." He contributed to a legal defence fund set up to help Nikolai Tolstoy, who was charged with libel in a 1989 case brought up by Lord Aldington over war crimes allegations made by Tolstoy related to this operation. Solzhenitsyn was exiled from the Soviet Union for his book The Gulag Archipelago. ... Combatants Allied Powers Axis Powers Commanders {{{commander1}}} {{{commander2}}} Strength {{{strength1}}} {{{strength2}}} Casualties 17 million military deaths 8 million military deaths {{{notes}}} World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a military conflict that took place between 1939 and 1945. ... Count Nikolai Tolstoy-Miloslavsky Count Nikolai Tolstoy-Miloslavsky (born 1935) is a prominent and controversial Russo-British historian and author, who writes under the name Nikolai Tolstoy. ... In English and American law, and systems based on them, libel and slander are two forms of defamation (or defamation of character), which is the tort or delict of making a false statement of fact that injures someones reputation. ... 1989 (MCMLXXXIX in Roman) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Sir Austin Richard William Toby Low, 1st Baron Aldington, Baron Low, PC, DSO (May 25, 1914 – December 7, 2000) was a British Conservative Party politician and businessman. ... A war crime is a punishable offense, under international law, for violations of the law of war by any person or persons, military or civilian. ...