The word 'volk' means 'people' in German but means 'wolf' in Russian. In WW2, did Russians think that German militia units were named after wolves and is there any references to this?

by shadilaypep
commiespaceinvader

No, because that's not how the transliteration of Russian and German works. When the Soviets referred to things like the "Volkssturm" or "Volksdeutsche", they transliterated and spoke those terms phonetically, meaning as "Фольксштурм" or "Фольксдойче". The "Ф" here is phonetically the close representation of an "F" because the "V" in German is most often pronounced as an "F", unlike the Russian "В", which while transliterated in English as a "V", is transliterated in German as a "W". Since it is not "Wolksdeutsche" or "Wolkssturm", there is no danger of mistaking "volk" as "волк".