Oleg RZHESHEVSKY
__TITLE__ WORLD WAR II Progress Publishers
Moscow
Translated from the Russian by Sergei Chulaki
Designed by Igor Saiko
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[2] CONTENTS Introduction Chapter One. Could the Second World War Have Been Prevented? .................. 11 The Causes of the War............. 11 Two Worlds---Two Policies............ 2!) A Stream of Lies and the Truth of History..... 57 The Policy of Appeasement Bears Its Fruit..... 7!) Chapter Two. Aggression and Disaster......... 103 Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk............ 104 The Liberation Mission of the Soviet Armed Forces . . 137 On the Soviet Contribution to the Victory over Japan . . 150 Why Is the Bourgeois Concept of "Decisive Battles" Unfounded? ..... .......... 157 Chapter Three. The Sources of Victory over the Aggres or . . 1 7u The Economic Factor .............. 172 The Political Factor............... 193 The Art of War................ 20!) The Vanguard of the People and the Armv..... 221 Chapter Four. The Second World War and Our Time , . . 227 The. New Balance of Forces and the Myth of the Soviet Threat ................... 2.28 Historians vs. History.............. 245 Conclusion.................... 269 Name Index.................... 273 __PRINTERS_P_3_COMMENT__ 1* [3] ~ [4] __ALPHA_LVL1__ INTRODUCTIONThe Second World War involved sixty-one countries, with eighty per cent of the population of the globe, and lasted six years. The tornado of fire swept over much of Europe, Asia and Africa, across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and even reached Australia. It brought colossal destruction and took millions of lives. The distress and the suffering it caused is impossible to measure.
The Second World War has been examined in thousands of books and in countless magazine and newspaper articles. It has been widely featured in cinema, TV films and radio broadcasts. And in spite of the fact that forty years have gone by since the end of that war, its history still fascinates many writers, scholars, and military scientists, while the events of those days continue to agitate the minds and hearts of ordinary people throughout the world.
The past few years have been fruitful ones for Soviet scholars who study the history of the Second World War. In 1978--1980, a six-volume collection of documents (The Soviet Union at International Conferences During the Great Patriotic War) was published under 'the editorship of Andrei Gromyko, member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU, First Deputy Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers and Minister for Foreign Affairs. In 1982, the last volume of the fundamental 12-volume History of the Second World War, 1939--1945 came out (with Marshal Dmitry Ustinov, member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU and Minister of Defence, as chairman of the chief 5 editorial commission). These studies came in for a great deal of attention in the Soviet Union and abroad, and enriched historical science with new important conclusions and with new facts of the heroism of the Soviet people who saved the world from fascist enslavement.
In 1984, scholars from socialist community countries produced a collective work, The Second World War. An Outline History.
In the West the history of the Second World War has been a subject of unabating interest. "The Second World War ... continues to attract more interest and to provoke more controversy than any other topic," wrote the British historian Walter Laqueur.^^1^^
The events of the past war still have an unremitting hold over the minds of people. Why? Because of the close connection between subsequent international developments and the results and lessons of that war, also the effect it had on people's lives, and the social and political inferences that can be made-for our own timefrom the study of its history.
The Second World War was coming to a head in conditions when capitalism had lost its omnipotence, and the first socialist state, the USSR, was already in existence. The division of the world into two systems diametrically opposed to one another, as a result of the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution, created the main contradiction of our epoch, that between capitalism and socialism. At the same time the contradictions between the imperialist states continued to deepen, leading to the formation of two rival coalitions: Germany, Italy and Japan, on the one side, and Britain, France and the United States, on the other.
One of the main features of the Second World War was that it began not only as a struggle for the redivision of the world between the imperialist powers. One coalition (Germany, Italy, and Japan) represented fascist regimes which were an openly terrorist dictatorship of _-_-_
^^1^^ Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 16, No. 1, January 1981, Special Issue, p. 1.
6 the most aggressive forces of monopoly capital. This coalition set out to conquer the world and establish the domination of the "chosen" races, to exterminate whole nations as "inferior" and to destroy their statehood and their centuries-old culture. Fascism openly proclaimed that its main goal was to wipe out the Marxist-Leninist ideology, and physically destroy its protagonists, the Communists. They also sought to destroy the Soviet Union, the bulwark of socialist revolution. The GermanyItalyjapan axis threatened to make short shrift of its capitalist rivals in Europe and Asia, to rout the United States, and to wipe out even the most elementary bourgeois freedoms.When Nazi Germany and its allies invaded the Soviet Union, the Soviet people began their Great Patriotic War which was to play such a decisive role in the Second World War. A socialist state in alliance with the democratic forces of many countries clashed with the aggressive fascist bloc in a battle unparalleled in scale and intensity. This signified the fundamental qualitative change in the socio-political character, in the scale and course of the war and its eventual outcome. The peoples of the world now had a clear-cut programme for routing the aggressor, for destroying fascism, for regaining national independence and democracy.
The Great Patriotic War was fought by a socialist country against the strike forces of international reaction embodied in fascism. That was a heroic struggle, a struggle in which the spirit of patriotism was fused with that of proletarian internationalism, a struggle in defence of the revolutionary gains of working people, in defence of progress and civilisation. The aims of the Great Patriotic War were humane, and close to the hearts of the peoples of all countries: to defend the motherland, to rout the invaders and to carry out the great mission of liberation of enslaved Europe, including Germany, from the fascist monsters, to enable the peoples themselves to choose their own political and economic system.
The long, hard road to victory in the Second World War mostly followed the Soviet-German front. This 7 principal theatre of operations saw the biggest battles and the fiercest fighting, which finally exhausted the enemy and drove him out of the Soviet Union. The Red Army liberated in full or in part thirteen countries of Europe and Asia with a total population of 200 million. The Soviet people not only successfully defended its socialist gains but actually saved the world from the fascist barbarians.
The struggle of the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany and its allies was headed by the Leninist Party, the militant vanguard of the working class and the entire Soviet nation. Conscious of its historical responsibility for the future of the people and the state, and for the cause of socialism, the Central Committee of the Party exercised its wisdom and courage in overcoming colossal difficulties caused by the war, mobilised all the material and spiritual forces of society, ralHed Soviet people to rout the enemy and win total victory. The advantages of the socialist system, the unity and cohesion of the entire Soviet people under the banner of the Communist Party were the most important sources of the invincibility of the socialist state, of its victory in the Great Patriotic War which was won by the joint efforts of the working class, the collective farmers, the people's intelligentsia, of all the big and small nations of this country.
Opposing the fascist-militarist bloc was the anti-Hitler coalition. The coincidence of national interests of a number of states served as the basis for an international front made up of different socio-political forces, the first ever in history. In that coalition only the Soviet Union with the Mongolian People's Republic were socialist states. Taking part in the struggle against the Nazi invaders and Japanese militarists were the armies of Great Britain, the United States, China, Canada, and several other countries. These armies were made up of workers and farmers, people of different social and religious backgrounds. In capitalist countries which were allied to the Soviet Union in the war, there were some political and military leaders who were fiercely opposed to cooperation with the USSR, but there was also quite a number who 8 favoured concerted action with the Soviet state against the common enemy.
Fighting heroically against the invaders were the people's armies of Yugoslavia, Greece, Albania, Poland and Czechoslovakia, and later, in the concluding stages of the war, the people's armies of Bulgaria and Romania, and the patriotic forces of Hungary. Fighting together against the Nazis lent new strength to their cooperation with their comrades-in-arms in the' Soviet army.
Courageous fighters in the resistance movement operating deep in the rear of the occupation troops both in Europe and Asia considerably weakened the combat potential of the invaders. Taking part in this movement were progressive forces in many countries headed by their working class and its vanguard, the communist parties. The peoples of Korea, Vietnam and other countries of Asia were also drawn into the national liberation struggle in the Far East and in Indo-China.
The Second World War ended in the collapse of the plans for world domination nurtured by German, Italian and Japanese imperialism, and showed that such designs in modern conditions are impossible to &arry out.
The historv of the Second World War is today the site of scholarly and ideological battles between MarxismLeninism and bourgeois systems of philosophical, economic and socio-political views.
Some of the better known Western historians have made a signal contribution to the study of the Second World War. Their authoritative works have been published in many countries, including the Soviet Union. These scholars attempt to get down to the roots of the war, to give a fair assessment of the course it took, its results and its lessons, thus helping to resolve the historical argument between the two opposing political systemssocialism and capitalism-on the basis of peaceful coexistence.
By contrast, Western historians who interpret the events of the war and its origins from positions of anti-communism take a different line, and their bias has a clear-cut direction. These historians are trying in every way to skirt the question of the responsibility of imperialism for 9 the preparation and unleashing of the war, to whitewash fascism and push the responsibility for the world slaughter onto the Soviet Union and other progressive forces. In addition to that they ascribe to the United States and Britain what they call "the dominant role" in the Second World War. By doing so they are trying to belittle the decisive contribution made by the Soviet Union to the defeat of the fascist-militarist bloc, and are deliberately distorting the results and lessons of that war in order to revive and inflate the myth of a "Soviet military threat" and to justify the arms drive let loose by the United States and its NATO allies.
Now that the confrontation of the forces of war and peace are the key factor in world developments, an objective estimate of the events of the Second World War, a good knowledge of its experience and lessons are vital to prevent a still more destructive nuclear war which would put the very life of humanity at risk.
MISSING FOOTNOTE NUMBER^^1^^
_-_-_^^1^^ Many books by Western historians and memoir writers about the Second World War, including the works of "official" historians, have been published in Russian in the Soviet Union: The Supreme Command by Forrest C. Pogue; The Invasion of France and Germany by Samuel Eliot Morison; The Campaigns of the Pacific War; Command Decisions (USA); five volumes of Grand Strategy (Great Britain); books by Charles de Gaulle and Henri Michel (France), Franz Haider and Kurt von Tippelskirch (FRG), H. Saburo and Takushiro Hattori (Japan). Among the works translated into Russian in the 1980s are the memoirs of Dwight D.Eisenhower Crusade in Europe and a study by the West German historian Klaus Reinhardt Die Wende vor Moskau. The Correspondence Between the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR with the Presidents of the United States and the Prime Ministers of Great Britain During the Great Patriotic War 1941--1945 was published in two editions (in 1957 and 1976).
[10] __NUMERIC_LVL1__ CHAPTER ONE __ALPHA_LVL1__ COULD THE SECOND WORLDEarly in the morning of September 1, 1939, the German battleship Schleswig-Hoktein suddenly opened fire on Poland's Westerplatte Peninsula. At the same time the Nazi Luftwaffe struck at Poland's airfields, communication centres, economic and administrative centres, and the German army invaded its territory. By the end of 1941, the war had spread almost to the whole world. Could the Second World War have been prevented, the tragedy avoided? A reply to this question requires certain theoretical knowledge about war as a social phenomenon, and would call for an analysis of its causes and for an objective assessment of the events that preceded its outbreak.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ THE CAUSES OF THE WARThe number of wars and major armed conflicts that have occurred throughout the recorded history of man runs into more than 14 thousand. The scale of wars and their effect on the future of the peoples have been growing all the time. In the era of imperialism wars affect the entire world. Humanity has gone through two destructive world wars: in 1914--1918 and in 1939--1945.
Politically, there are just wars of-liberation, wars aimed at beating off foreign aggression. Then there are unjust, aggressive wars whose purpose it is to seize and enslave other nations. The Second World War was a just war 11 of liberation in so far as it was waged by the peoples against fascist aggression.
Wars are not inevitable. There was a time when people did not know what war was, and the time is sure to come when war will be ruled out, banished from the life of society.
The key to the mystery of the origins of war, and to the causes of the Second World War, is provided by the Marxist-Leninist definition of war as a continuation of the policies of a given state, or class, by violent methods. "And it was always the standpoint of Marx and Engels, who regarded any war as the continuation of the politics of the powers concerned-and the various classes within these countries-in a definite period.''^^1^^
The Second World War was unleashed by the German capitalist monopolies, by the Nazi leaders and by the German General Staff, but preparations for it had been made by international imperialism for the purpose of destroying the world's first socialist state, the Soviet Union. Blind with class hatred, the imperialists sought to carry out their plans to destroy Soviet Russia back in 1918--1920 by supporting the internal counter-revolutionary forces, by open military intervention and blockade, but were thwarted in their designs. In the period between the two world wars the imperialists mounted an antiSoviet campaign.
The chief instigators of this campaign were the American and British imperialists who sought to use Germany and Japan, their main rivals, in the struggle against the USSR. The U.S. and British monopolists hoped that by doing so they would destroy the socialist state and would also weaken their rivals.
The military danger was particularly great when the Nazis came to power in Germany. As was pointed out at the Seventh Congress of the Comintern (1935), the transition of the bourgeoisie to the fascist methods of _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "The Collapse of the Second International", Collected Works, Vol. 21, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1977, p. 219.
12 ensuring its rule was part and parcel of its preparation for a new world war.The forces of imperialism which stoked up the flames of the Second World War thus fqund themselves torn between the two opposite historical trends as discovered by Lenin. On the one hand, the imperialist states wanted to stay united so as to uphold their class interests and the whole system of exploitation, and consequently were all ranged against the Soviet Union and poised for a clash between the two socio-political systems. On .the other hand, the contradictions between individual capitalist states tended to grow deeper and deeper, with rival coalitions forming as a result.
Supported by all the progressive forces of the world, the Soviet Union opposed war and fascism. The prewar years were marked by the strenuous efforts of the Communist Party and the Soviet Government to create a system of collective security and curb fascist aggression, also by the Soviet Union's actions in defence of Ethiopia, Spain, China, Austria, Czechoslovakia, and by varied, including military, assistance it extended to many countries which had fallen victim to aggression.
A new feature of the prewar situation was the fact that communist and workers' parties of the Leninist type were active in most of the capitalist countries. These parties were equipped with a knowledge of the laws of social development and steeled in class struggles. The communist parties formed a powerful social force which stood up against the imperialist plans to unleash a world war. They also laid bare the policy of connivance with the aggressors and fought to curb the growth of the malignant tumour of fascism. And when the war did break out the communist and workers' parties mounted the struggle for the national revival of the enslaved countries.
The Second World War began as an armed clash within the imperialist camp. The leading powers of the Anglo-French and German-Italian coalitions had failed to .achieve a compromise and in this way to join efforts in their struggle against the USSR. The anti-Soviet 13 conspiracy was foiled by the Leninist foreign policy of the CPSU which made good use of the contradictions between capitalist countries in the interests of the security of socialism. The USSR never threatened anyone but it checked any and all provocations by the aggressors and for almost two years resisted being drawn into the Second World War and continued its peaceful pursuits, at the same time strengthening its defences. Significantly, the rival coalitions continued to be deeply hostile to the Soviet Union, and to socialism in general, so that even while trading blows, these capitalist rivals never abandoned their efforts to wreck the Soviet state, the birthplace of socialism. History has presented an unpayable account to imperialism which started that terrible war.
In order to whitewash imperialism, which has always been and will remain a source of wars, bourgeois ideologists are deliberately distorting the facts as to the causes of wars and their social and class character, thus confusing the issue. They regard war outside the development of capitalism, outside the economic relations and policies of the exploiter classes, and are trying to conceal the true instigators of aggression.
One of the favourite arguments resorted to by bourgeois theoreticians is that "war is a natural condition of society". Wars have always been and will always be fought while the human race exists-this is the cornerstone of their most widely used concept, supported by a host of anthropological, theological and other "arguments". Margaret Mead (USA) regards war as "a recognized conflict between two groups as groups, in which each group puts an army ... into the field to fight and kill, if possible, some of the members of the army of the other group". "Warfare of this sort," she continues, "is an invention like any other ... such as writing, marriage, 14 cooking our food instead of eating it raw, trial by jury or burial of the dead, and so on.''^^1^^
Professor John G. Stoessinger writes in his book Why Nations Go to War that all attempts to link the causes of war with militarism, military blocs and economic factors are nothing but lifeless abstractions. In his opinion "war should be seen to occur in generations cycles", and as a natural course of things in the life of every generation of people.^^2^^
Also widely circulating are different kinds of theological theories according to which "wars are preordained and permitted by God'',^^3^^ "a just peace can be found only in the world beyond", and there can be no peace on earth.^^4^^ The West German philosopher Reinhart Koselleck backs his theory with the fact that in spite of the efforts of F. D. Roosevelt, who shortly before his death in April 1945 confirmed his resolve to work for a lasting peace, the globe has over the past several years, just as before, been in the grip of civil wars, armed conflicts, etc.^^5^^ His book offers no analysis of the military threat by imperialism and passes over in silence the fact that the growing forces of peace, democracy and socialism have for close to four decades been trying to ward off the conflagration of a third world war.
Bourgeois theoreticians most often look for the causes of war in "hasty" decisions by government leaders, in the poor efficiency of intelligence services, and in other factors which are either accidental or unimportant.
In his analysis of the prewar foreign policy of the United States, Waverly Root inferred in 1945 that "the disastrous record of American foreign policy can _-_-_
^^1^^ Margaret Mead, "Warfare Is Only an Invention-Not a Biological Necessity", in: Peace and War. Ed. by Charles R. Beitz and Theodore Herman. W. H. Freeman and Company, San Francisco, 1973, p. 113.
~^^2^^ John G. Stoessinger, Why Nations Go to War. St. Martin's Press, New York, 1974, pp. Ill-IV.
~^^3^^ Reinhart Koselleck, Vergangene Zukunft. Zur Semantik geschichtlicher Zeiten. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, 1979, S. 360.
~^^4^^ Ibid., S. 140.
^^5^^ Ibid., S. 275.
15 be ascribed to factors no more exotic than misinformation, short-sightedness, small-mindedness and the human weakness for self-justification and rationalization which led American diplomats, once engaged in a mistaken way, to persist in it, in preference to admitting or even perceiving the error''.^^1^^ Some twenty-five years later John Toland said essentially the same thing. For instance, in his analysis of the events that brought Japan into a war against the United States he wrote: "The trouble was that both America and Japan were like children. Diplomatically, neither was mature. Now the two children were playing foolish war games."^^2^^Also prevalent in the Western literature on the subject is the agnostic interpretation of the causes of war. This view rejects, either in full or in part, the possibility of even understanding, to say nothing of explaining the causes of war. Significant in this respect is the interpretation of the concept of "war" that some Western scholars from a number of countries give in the voluminous Encyclopaedia Universalis published in France. According to this extensive study which consists of a gamut of contradictory concepts, "war is a universally established fact. It is very difficult even to trace the direct transition from a clash between two individuals or two families to a dash between two more or less considerable groups, which could justifiably be called a war"~.^^3^^
At the present level of development of historical science, at a time when the.problems of war and peace have come under public scrutiny, such primitive disquisitions can hardly pass muster. This axiomatic truth has led Western scholars to mount a search for new "war _-_-_
~^^1^^ Waverly Root, The Secret History of the War, Vol. II. Charles Scanner's Sons, New York, 1945, p. 189.
~^^2^^ John Toland, The Rising Sun. New York, 1970, p. 259.
~^^3^^ Encyclopaedia Universalis. Vol. 8, Paris, 1974, pp. 99--100.
16 doctrines" suitable for the exploiter classes. In France, the FRG, Italy, Holland and some other countries, special polemology research centres have sprung up to study the causes of wars (from the Greek polemos-wa.r and logos - science).According to polemologists, war arises from a disbalance of different age groups in society. If a country shows a tendency for rapid growth of the younger part of the population and has developed the socio-economic conditions that make it impossible to provide all young people with jobs, a demographic situation will arise which the polemologists call "an explosive structure" or "a bellicose demographic structure".
__FIX__ Crease in page.The explosive structure is conducive to social disturbances, bellicose impulses which build up towards collective aggressiveness and social upheavals, and towards elimination of the more active part of the population through war.
By giving undue prominence to the socio-biological causes of war and by divorcing war from economics and politics, polemologists absolve the ruling classes and the governments of the imperialist states of all responsibility for unleaishing wars and virtually justify any form of aggression. They claim, for instance, that all major imperialist acts of aggression were nothing but population explosions., each act corresponding to the highest degree of internal social instability stemming from "an excess of young people''.^^1^^ Following this line of reasoning they contend that Nazi Germany and fascist Italy waged their aggressive wars primarily because both had an explosive demograp hie structure emanating strong bellicose impulses, and bothi had built up an "aggressive potential". In substance this conclusion shatters the pseudoscientific claims of the polemologists that their "science" can rid humanity of all wars.
Another established line taken by Western scholars in explaining the causes of war is the so-called inter-- _-_-_
^^1^^ Gaston Bouthoul, Biologic sociale. Presses universitaires de France, Paris, 1964, p 95.
17 disciplinary ("complex") approach to the phenomenon of war, and especially the political factor as it was formulated by Clausewitz in the nineteenth century. The German military theoretician Carl von Clausewitz, whose views were influenced by the social upheavals and wars following the French Revolution, was opposed to the interpretation put on war by metaphysicians who still wield influence in the West. He held, for example, that war "is a particular manifestation of social relations". The central point in his war doctrine was the inter-cohnection between war and politics. "War is nothing but a continuation of state politics by different means",^^1^^ he said in elaboration of his view that war was impossible outside politics. "War in human society-among nations, and particularly among civilised nations-always stems from a political situation and is always politically motivated."^^2^^Examining Clausewitz's formula Lenin pointed out that war was not merely the continuation of the politics of the powers concerned by other, violent means, but the continuation of the policy of a definite class in concrete historical conditions. This is the substance of the problem which underlies the causes and character of any war. Today many Western scholars specialising in this problem are compelled to admit that "Marxism-Leninism possesses the most fully elaborated theory of war."^^3^^
The "complex" theory of war, which, its authors admit, leaves too many loose ends, was originated by the American theorist Quincy Wright at the time of the Second World War. Wright believed that "war has politicotechnological, juro-ideological, socio-religious, and psychoeconomic causes".^^4^^
In A Study of War, Wright synthesised Clauzewitz's _-_-_
~^^1^^ Carl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege. Verlag des Ministeriums fur Nationale Verteidigung, Berlin, 1957, S. 6.
~^^2^^ Ibid., S. 33.
~^^3^^ Keith L. Nelson, Spencer C. Olin, Jr, Why War? Ideology, Theory and History. University of California Press, Berkeley, 1979, p. 74.
~^^4^^ Quincy Wright, A Study of War. Vol. II, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1942, p. 739.
18 concept, and various biological, anthropological and theological views in these words: "While man has original drives that make war possible, that possibility has only been realized in appropriate social and political conditions."^^1^^ How could war be prevented? The author fails to give a clear-cut answer to this fundamental question.Notable among the schools that study the causes of war are the school of "political realism" and the school of "political idealism". The names of these schools in the historiography and theory of international relations stand not so much for the concepts of idealism and realism in the conventional sense of the terms, but for very definite political trends in foreign policy. The supporters of the school of political idealism claim that foreign policy actions taken by capitalist countries are motivated by lofty aspirations, the struggle for the moral values of a nation, and other similar idealistic motives. The exponents of the second school proceed from the assumption that countries rely exclusively on force and resort to moral considerations only to justify its use.
Western authors often "combine" the views of the two schools. The American historian and diplomat George F. Kennan apparently followed the views of "political realism" when he wrote that "the legalistic approach to international relations is faulty".^^2^^ At the same time his interpretation of the political and diplomatic decisions of the U. S. government bears the mark of the school of "political idealism" and the theories of "moral causality". For example, Kennan interpreted the imperialistic tendencies of his country in the late 19th century by the established traditions and by the widely accepted claim that the Americans "simply liked the smell of empire", "liked to see our flag flying on distant tropical islands", "to bask in the sunshine of recognition as one of the great imperial powers of the world". The debate _-_-_
^^1^^ Ibid., Vol. I, p. 5.
~^^2^^ George F. Kennan, American Diplomacy 1900--7950. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1952, p. 99.
19 between the "advocates of idealism" and the "advocates of realism" continues to this day.^^1^^The different views on the causes of war may create the impression that bourgeois theoreticians and historians have no common roots in their interpretation of this problem. This is not so, of course. Far as they may be from genuine science and historical practice, and contradictory as may be their views on the causes of war, including the causes of the Second World War, these different "schools" and groups of Western historians and philosophers are all at one in their desire to conceal, in every possible way, the responsibility of imperialism for starting both world wars.^^2^^
Methods of achieving this goal vary depending on the political leanings of the historian, his credentials as a scholar and, of course, the purpose of his work, the market and certain other factors.
In his book The American Approach to Foreign Policy Professor Dexter Perkins asks this question: "Is There an American Imperialism?" Replying to this question, he apparently tries to convince his readers that the concept of "imperialism" is "a Russian propaganda device", that the United States has never been, nor is it today, an imperialist country.^^3^^ And since there is no imperialism in the United States, there is no basis for accusing it of having a hand in starting the Second World War.
Meanwhile the history of the United States as an imperialist country is a record of numerous aggressive wars, of the fierce and bloody struggle of monopoly capital for world domination, the exploitation of its own working people, the suppression of progressive popular movements, and finally, the scheming of its ruling elite against the world's first socialist state. All this goes to _-_-_
^^1^^ For more details see: O. Rzheshevsky, War and History, Moscow, 1976, pp. 109--111 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ See also E. I. Rybkin, Critique of Bourgeois Doctrines on the Causes of Wars and on Their Role in History. A philosophico-historical essay, Moscow, 1979 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ Dexter Perkins, The American Approach to Foreign Policy. Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1962, pp. 29, 98.
20 show that the term "American imperialism" is not just "a Russian propaganda device" and not an "anti-communist entity", but a very concrete socio-political phenomenon, and in fact the leading force of world imperialism.There are a few Western historians who admit, albeit in a limited and nebulous way, that the chief responsibility for wars rests with the imperialists. L. L. Farrar notes, for example, that "imperialism reflected the view that the state system was essentially' competitive and that view perhaps prepared people to accept war as an appropriate, indeed necessary, policy outcome''.^^1^^
The attempts to conceal the aggressive nature of imperialism can clearly be seen in the interpretation of the substance of fascism, the system that unleashed the Second World War. The study of fascism, if there is any, is reduced, as a rule, to attempts to camouflage its class essence and merely enumerate the changes which took place in the policies of the Axis countries after Hitler, Mussolini and the Japanese militarists had taken over in their countries. "The advent of Hitler set off the rearmament of Germany", this stereotype directly or indirectly made Hitler and his "psychopathic personality" exclusively responsible for the Second World War. In his book, The End of Glory, Laurence Lafore puts forth a version of his own, imputing to fascism "the most leftist and revolutionary programmes of the time: abolition of monarchy and nobility, anticlericalism and anticapitalism", although in the final analysis it succumbed to the pressure of "wild chauvinism" and "upgrading of organization". The author concludes that fascism was "to a considerable extent the work of cheap political jobbery".^^2^^ Robert Leckie in his book The Wars of America links _-_-_
~^^1^^ War. A Historical, Political and Social Study, Ed. by L. L. Farrar, ABC-Clio, Inc., Santa Barbara (Cal.), 1978, p. 166. .
~^^2^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory. An Interpretation of the Origins of World War II. J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, 1970, pp. 68-7).
21 fascism in Germany and Italy with authoritarian nationalism, and the variety of fascism that prevailed in Japan with theocratic militarism. The reader, however, gets lost in the maze of terms and vaguely worded pronouncements and hypotheses, and fails to trace the organic link between imperialism, fascism and war.The country where fascism seems to have come under constant scrutiny, both in literature and in the press, is the Federal Republic of Germany. Most commonly it is described as the product of the interplay of certain "irrational factors" which brought forth the "fatal", "demoniac personality" of Adolf Hitler. In their attempts to present Hitler as some sort of "superman" many Western historians claim that "national socialism was Hitler's own creation"^^1^^ and it was he himself that shaped history "with such a monumental high-handedness"^^2^^.
As far back as the Nuremberg Trial of the leading Nazi war criminals, the idea was being peddled in the West that Hitler alone was responsible for the outbreak of the Second World War. Churchill noted at the time that "it was in the interest of the parties concerned after they were the prisoners of the Allies to dwell upon their efforts for peace".^^3^^ Echoing the ex-Nazi generals and German monopolists who persisted at the trial in their version that it was impossible to curb Hitler's drive for war, many Western historians still write that "the greatest war of all time" began not as a logical historical development, that is to say, it did not result from the policies of the imperialists, but was unleashed in cold blood by the evil spirit of Adolf Hitler obsessed by total destruction.^^4^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Joseph Wulf, Aus dem Lexikon der Morder. "Sonderbehandlung" und verwandte Wane in nationalsozialistischen Dokumenten. Sigbert Mohn Verlag, Giitersloh, 1963, S. 9.
~^^2^^ Joachim C.Fest, Hitler. Eine Biographie. Bd. 1, Verlag Ullstein, Frankfurt am Main, 1976, S.23.
~^^3^^ Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War, Vol. I, Cassell& Co. Ltd., London, 1949, p. 280.
~^^4^^ Michael Freund. Deutsche Gesctuchte. Bertelsmann Lexikon Verlag, Gutersloh, 1974, S. 1179.
22The prevalent trend in bourgeois history-writing to exaggerate Hitler's role in the emergence of fascism and war has been modified over the years into the tendency of giving the fascist leaders "a human face". The books of the West German historian Werner Maser are a typical example of this. At first glance his writings seem to have no clearly defined concept. In fact, he ventures no conclusions or evaluations of his own. In the preface to his book about Hitler he writes for example: "I must admit that the documents and my own work on this book held many surprises in store."^^1^^ You may wonder what kind of surprises. The very idea of writing this book was to show Hitler in quite a different colour. Not as a maniac and tyrant, but as a sentimental and quite amiable person. The author tries to seem aloof when commenting on the documents he quotes. But his bias is obvious when he "argues" with the Fiihrer's overt supporters and sympathisers who present him as a "servant of Germany". Maser's comment: "This was only partly correct."^^2^^
Soviet researchers quite correctly emphasise that such evaluations not only fly in the face of the truth, but are also very dangerous since they constitute a kind of tribute to fascism and its leaders.^^3^^
Another typical feature of West German historiography is a desire to present fascism as a social movement of the petty bourgeoisie and the lower middle class, and to obscure the leading role played by the more reactionary wing of the monopoly bourgeoisie in the establishment of fascist dictatorship. According to Helga Grebing, fascism was born of the middle classes which were neither the working nor the exploiter class. So, she concludes, "one can practically speak about the _-_-_
^^1^^ Werner Maser, Hitlers Briefe und Notizen. Sein Weltbild in handschriftlichen Dokumenten. Econ Verlag, Dusseldorf, 1973, S.7.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 38.
~^^3^^ D. Melnikov, L. Chernaya, Criminal Number One. The Nazi Regime and Jts Fiihrer. Moscow, 1981, p. 36 (in Russian).
23 classless nature of fascism".^^1^^ Echoing this opinion, Richard Saage put forward a thesis of the middle strata of society giving rise to the "third class" which in turn made fascism its "decisive" force.^^2^^The much touted "mass society" theory serves essentially the same purpose.^^3^^ The protagonists of this theory have proclaimed our age the age of the masses, and are trying to prove that the seizure by the National Socialists of political power in 1933 amounted to a "revolution" which showed mankind a "third way" of of development, neither capitalist nor socialist.^^4^^
In actual fact fascism was used to suppress the revolutionary movement of the peoples, and particularly that of the working class, and its vanguard, the international communist movement. As was pointed out at the Seventh Congress of the Communist International in 1935, "Fascist Germany is plainly showing to the whole world what the masses of the people may expect where fascism is victorious. The raging fascist government is annihilating the flower of the working class, its leaders and organizers, in jails and concentration camps. It has destroyed the trade unions, the cooperative societies, all legal organizations of the workers as well as all other non-fascist political and cultural organizations. It has deprived the workers of the elementary right to defend their interests. It has converted a highly cultured country into a hotbed of obscurantism, barbarity and war."~^^5^^
The fascist dictatorships in Italy, Germany and some _-_-_
~^^1^^ Helga Grebing, Aktuelle Theorien iiber Faschismus und Konservatismus. Eine Kritik. Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart, 1974, S.104.
~^^2^^ Richard Saage, Faschismustheorien. Eine Einfiihrung. Verlag C. H. Beck, Miinchen, 1976, S. 118.
~^^3^^ See V. S. Diakin, The Age of the Masses, and the Responsibility of the Classes. A Critique of Modem Bourgeois Historiography. Collected articles, Leningrad, 1967, pp. 315--399; G. K.Ashin, The Doctrine of Mass Society. Moscow, 1971 (both in Russian).
~^^4^^ Karl Dietrich Bracher, Europa in der Krise. Innengeschichte und Weltpolitik seit 1917. Frankfurt am Main, 1979, S. 176--179.
~^^5^^ VII Congress of the Communist International. Abridged Stenographic Record of Proceedings, Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1939, p. 572.
24 other capitalist countries were established in the 1920s and 1930s as a result of imperialism's onslaught on the working people. The reactionary forces took advantage of the split in the working class, precipitated primarily by the right opportunist leaders of Social Democracy who were preaching social partnership and anti-communism. But wherever a broad popular front was set up on the initiative of Communists, as was the case in France, fascism was unable to grab power. In Spain, on the other hand, the fascists succeeded solely owing to direct military support from the fascist regimes in Italy and Germany, which sent troops to that country in 1936--1939.The ruling classes of the imperialist states who plunged the world into the Second World War pursued interests that were totally alien to the popular masses. The much hated fascist regimes threatened not only the freedom, but the very existence of whole nations. Led by the Communists, the popular masses fought against fascism and in this way defended their right to life, liberty and social progress.
Another attempt to explain the reasons for the Second World War is a study undertaken by a group of historians headed by Manfred Messerschmidt at the MilitaryHistory Research Department of the Bundeswehr, published in the first volume of Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite WeUkrieg. Its authors are clearly out to lead the way for all other bourgeois historians on this question when they declare "the need to integrate all the existing research mostly for providing abundant information for those readers who are interested in history''.^^1^^
The various ideological, economic, military and foreign policy aspects of Germany's preparations for war are analysed in considerable detail with the ensuing, though highly qualified, admission of the aggressive nature of German imperialism and the guilt that the fascist Reich bore for initiating the Second World War.
The authors touch upon some social aspects of Germany's war-motivated policy. "Fear of a revolution was the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 1 (Vorwort), Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1979, S. 11.
25 context in which Hitler's policy developed..."^^1^^ they said, putting the onus for Germany's policy on "the bourgeois national groups and their representatives at the Foreign Ministry, in the Wehrmacht, in the economy and science, who carried on the national traditions of the country.... They hailed and supported rearmament in every way possible.... Their aim was to extend the great power positions of Germany far beyond a mere revision of the Versailles Treaty by incorporating Eastern Europe, the Eastern Empire.... The use of military force in these political calculations was regarded as a matter of fact.''^^2^^This specious line of reasoning is nothing but an attempt to lay the entire blame for the war at Hitler's door and in this way to exonerate the German monopoly capitalists of the crimes of fascism. The authors are clearly trying to disprove the Comintern assessment of fascism as a dictatorship of the most reactionary, chauvinistic elements of finance capital. They cite the Comintern definition of fascism and then hasten to add that "Hitler cannot by rights be regarded as a puppet of finance capital. Was it not Hitler who held sway over the masses in prewar Germany? This specifically applied to the period after the year 1936 and through the entire war. It was he who laid down the policies leading to the outbreak of hostilities on September 1. Had it not been for Hitler there would have been no war in Europe which broke out on September 1, 1939."^^3^^ In other words, today's West German historians have taken up this new line of reasoning to give a fresh lease on life to the old myth of Hitler's undivided personal responsibility for the war, and in this way to brighten up the facade of imperialism and fascism- not without some important shift of emphasis, of course.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 1 (Vorwort), S. 70S.
~^^2^^ Ibid., S. 715.
^^3^^ Ibid., S. 18.
26Finally, modern bourgeois theories about war have one thing in common-their anti-communism. Moderate conservatives and neo-fascists, liberal Malthusians, eclectics, and theologians are all trying, each in his own way, to bend their arguments so as to somehow link the causes of war with the revolutionary struggle of the working people and to make believable their allegation that the socialist system also had a hand in the unleashing of the Second World War. The American theoretician Louis Fischer clamours that "war, not peace, is the crucible of communism".^^1^^
Such pseudo-historical "views" have been promoted, especially in the past several years, in order to justify the aggressive aspirations of monopoly capital which are particularly evident in the foreign policy of the United States, its allies and satellites spearheaded against the USSR and against all revolutionary forces of our time.^^2^^ "All the crusades of our epoch are promoted by 'political commissars'- with a new political creed."^^3^^
At the same time some theoreticians take a more realistic view of the international events that preceded the Second World War. Raymond L. Garthoff (USA) writes that right from the inception of the Soviet state it "became an axiom of Soviet policy that war should be avoided". The Soviet republic, he goes on to say, "renounced all of imperial Russia's economic, political, and military rights ... abroad-in Turkey, Persia, Afghanistan, Sinkiang, Tuva, Manchuria and China". Garthoff pointed out that "military force was not overtly used [by the Soviet state-TV.] from 1921...", the Soviet Union did not want a war with Finland, that "on a number of _-_-_
~^^1^^ Louis Fischer, Russia's Road from Peace to War. Soviet Foreign Relations 1917--1941. Harper & Row Publishers, New York, 1969, p. 5.
~^^2^^ For details see S. A. Tyushkevich, Philosophy and Military Theory, Moscow, 1975 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ Gaston Bouthoul, Rene Carrere et Jean-Louis Annequin, Guerres et civilisa/iiiiis (de la prehistoire a I'ere nucleo-spatiale). Les Cahiers de la Fondation pour les etudes de defense nationale. CahierNo. 14. Supplement au numero 4 (1979) de "Strategique", Paris, 1979, p. 90.
27 occasions after 1921, the Russians led in championing disarmament".^^1^^ Despite the author's anti-socialist bias, the above evaluations of Soviet foreign policy give additional proof that the arguments used by reactionary historians are unfounded.Richard J, Barnet, another American historian, concludes from his study of U.S. foreign policy that the main source of war should be sought in the nature of the imperialist nations. In his book, Roots of War, he raises this question; what are the national interests that the United States sought to serve by "spreading death, terror, and destruction"?^^2^^ In answering this question he writes: "By any historical definition the United States is an empire. From the birth of the Republic in 1776 to the outbreak of World War II the area under the dominion of the United States increased from 400,000 square miles to 3,738,393 square miles.... In World War II the United States did not legally annex further territory, but it assumed total control of 'strategic trust territories' and other bases and thereby increased its global domain...."^^3^^
Looking ahead Barnet points out that "war is a social institution, that America's permanent war can be explained primarily by looking at American Society, and that America's wars will cease only if that society is changed."^^4^^ Barnet proposes to eliminate war by putting through reforms in America's politics and economy, by curbing the power of the military industrial complex, and by renouncing America's endless claims on other countries. In this sense his approach is constructive in so far as it reveals the true causes of war and charts ways for amelioration of the international situation. However, most present-day bourgeois authors take a view different from Barnet's and are trying to find the answer to another, very different question: how did it happen that the Second World War began with a clash between _-_-_
^^1^^ Raymond L. Garthoff, Soviet Military Policy. A Historical Analysis, Frederick A. Praeger Publishers, New York, 1966, pp. 10, 14, 123.
~^^2^^ Richard J. Barnet, Roots of War. Atheneum, New York, 1972, p. 5.
~^^3^^ Ibid, p. 17.
~^^4^^ Ibid, p. .5. 28
28 imperialist coalitions, making it impossible to create a united front of imperialist powers directed against the Soviet Union? In their pragmatic way, they try to draw a lesson from this "fatal mistake". They analyse the Versailles system of treaties, the rearmament of Nazi Germany, the emergence of fascism, the policy of appeasement, the collapse of collective security plans for Europe, indeed, many of the factors that led to the Second World War and which have been examined carefully from Marxist positions. However, the bourgeois interpretation of these events willfully misrepresents them, and is, of course, anti-Soviet in spirit. Some of these bourgeois theoreticians and historians claim that "The only thing the United States could have done to maintain peace would have been to have stationed American troops permanently in Western Europe.''^^1^^ This approach clearly shows that reactionary studies are turning into a direct apology for NATO's aggressive plans and for militarism in even broader terms.The sweeping anti-war movement in Western Europe shows that the broad segments of public opinion are becoming increasingly aware of the true dimensions of the military threat inherent in the deployment of American troops in foreign countries.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ TWO WORLDS-TWO POLICIESAnalysis of the events which climaxed in the Second World War is more often than not reduced to a mere recounting of the foreign policy actions and diplomatic activities of different countries in the period between the two great wars. Significantly, the problems of internal policy are merely touched upon, while those of the economy and ideology, with a few exceptions, are largely ignored. Besides, the pre-Munich part (1919--1938) of the period between the two wars is given fairly perfunctory treatment compared to the years (1938--1939) immediately _-_-_
~^^1^^ Keith Eubank, The Origins of World War 11, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, New York, 1969, p. 16.
29 following the Munich agreement. This betrays a tendency to leave the .actual causes of war and the process of its gestation outside the pale of serious historical study.Let us take a look at some assessments by bourgeois historians of the major events that took place between the two wars.
Most bourgeois historiographers take a critical, albeit one-sided, view of the Treaty of Versailles. The American historian Telford Taylor sees the shortcomings of the treaty in that it was "heavy enough to block a healthy evolution of Franco-British policy toward Germany, but impotent to check the mood and muscle of the Third Reich."^^1^^ At the same time he contends that the Treaty of Versailles could have played its role if it had been "streamlined" to suit the changing situation in Europe. It was modified on the economic plane (cancelling of reparations), but in other respects-military and territorialeverything remained unchanged, which caused Hitler to take "unilateral" action. "Fearful of the consequences of relaxing them [provisions], France gradually lost the will and eventually the strength to enforce them.''^^2^^ Taylor avoids any straightforward assessment of the treaty.
Reactionary literature in the FRG basically tries to justify Germany's refusal to honour its commitments under the treaty. It condones the revision of this treaty by force and the aggressive policy of Nazi Germany. Heinrich Hartle contends that Germany rejected the Treaty of Versailles and took the road of remilitarisation, just because it was compelled to "strengthen its defences", 'lo "protect its frontiers" in view of the alleged "SovietFrench threat"^^3^^
_-_-_^^1^^ Telford Taylor, Munich. The Price of Peace. Doubleday & Company Inc., Garden City, New York, 1979, p. 77.
~^^2^^ Ibidem.
^^3^^ Heinrich Hartle, Die Kriegsschuld des Sieger. Churchills, Roosevelts und StalinsVerbrechen gegen den Weltfrieden. Verlag K. W. Schiitz KG., Pr. Olden dorf, 1971, S. 117.
30More and more books on the Treaty of Versailles are being written in all the capitalist countries that took part in the First World War, especially in France, the FRG, Britain and the United States. The common intent of all these writings is to prove that the Treaty of Versailles was "unfair", particularly to Germany. What is the ulterior motive of this contention?
On January 18, 1919, with pomp and circumstance and in a blaze of publicity, the victorious allies in the First World War met at Versailles to work out conditions for a postwar settlement. Present at that conference were 27 nations which had been at war with the Central Powers (Germany, Austro-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria) or had severed diplomatic relations with Germany during the war. However, those who were actually to decide the shape of things to come were, of course, Britain, France and the United States. Germany and her former allies in the war were not allowed to the conference table, Soviet Russia was also suspended from participation, although it was Russia that had borne the brunt of the war and had virtually saved Britain and France from defeat in 1914--1916. The highest priority at the talks in Versailles was given to the so-called Russian question, i.e., the struggle against the young socialist state. The Paris Peace Conference had, to all intents and purposes, become the chief organiser of armed intervention against Soviet Russia.~^^1^^
On June 26, 1919, the Versailles peace treaty was signed thus formally ending the First World War. The main body at the conference was the Council of Four made of President Wilson of the United States, Prime Minister Clemenceau of France, Prime Minister Lloyd George of Britain, and Prime Minister Orlando of Italy.
The system of Versailles legally formalised the plunder, dependence, poverty and hunger of millions of people, the enslavement, as Lenin put it, of the "seven-tenths _-_-_
~^^1^^ A History of the First World War J974-J318. Vol. 2, Moscow, 1975, pp. 534--535 (in Russian).
31 of the world's population".^^1^^ The Versailles system grew out of the desire of the victor countries to re-carve the map of Europe at the expense of defeated Germany and her allies, to gain access to new markets and raw material resources, and acquire new colonies and new spheres of influence. The main goal of that system was to replace German hegemony in Europe with Anglo-French hegemony, to tip the balance of forces in favour of Britain, France and the United States. Moreover, the victors sought to turn Germany into a tool to destroy, or at least weaken, the Soviet Russia. Thus the Versailles documents reflected also the fundamental contradictions of the general crisis of capitalism-those between the capitalist and the socialist systems. "This is no peace, but terms dictated ... by armed robbers,"^^2^^ Lenin wrote in those days.The entire history of the treaty of Versailles, from the time it was signed down to the beginning of the Second World War, was an uninterrupted record of erosion of the Versailles system, which gradually degenerated into efforts by the Western nations to prod Germany towards aggression against the USSR.
Bourgeois authors spotlight certain events in the run-up to the Second World War, such as the seizure of the Rhineland by Germany, of Ethiopia by Italy, Japanese aggression in the Far East, also the civil war in Spain. But all these events were as a rule tied up with the policy of "appeasement" which, they maintain, Britain and France pursued in Europe, and the United States in the Far East.
Let us take a look at this concept of appeasement as treated by bourgeois historians, since this is especially _-_-_
^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "Speech Delivered at a Conference of Chairmen of Uyezd, Volost and Village Executive Committees of Moscow Gubernia, October 15, 1920", Collected Works, Vol. 31, 1982, p. 326.
~^^2^^ Ibidem.
32 important for understanding the causes of the Second World War.``Appeasement, is a technique of diplomacy. With eithei a balance of power or preponderance of power, conciliation can adjust ambitions and rivalries, compensate change, and maintain international equilibrium and harmony among states."^^1^^ The allegation that the policy of appeasement of Nazi Germany was aimed at maintaining peace is central in bourgeois historical thought which follows a definite pattern: Germany was the aggressor, unfairly cut off by the Treaty of Versailles, while Britain, France and the United States were the nations which sought to achieve peace and equilibrium in Europe. The authorship of the policy of appeasement is imputed to the British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George. "Lloyd George hoped the peace would endure long after the memories of the war had faded, and he therefore warned against a treaty of humiliation."^^2^^
This interpretation of appeasement is remarkable in that it reveals the purpose of the Western powers to strengthen the German Reich and conceals the counterrevolutionary, anti-Soviet nature of this policy.
American historian Laurence Lafore begins his fundamental study of the period between the two wars with the Locarno talks in 1925 which produced the first postVersailles international treaties between the imperialist states that envisioned Germany's aggression to the East.^^3^^ He writes, in the face of the well-known facts, that "the British aim was to extend the Locarno principle to every _-_-_
^^1^^ Appeasement of the Dictators. Crisis Diplomacy? Ed. by W. Laird KleineAhlbrandt. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1970, p. 1.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 1.
^^3^^ Under the Locarno treaties, Germany- France and Belgium undertook to maintain the integrity of the German-French and German-Belgian borders set up by the Treaty of Versailles with Britain and Italy acting as guarantors. The guarantees did not apply to Germany's borders with Poland and Czechoslovakia, which clearly showed that the British and the Americans sought to channel Germany's aggressive potential against the Soviet Union, as well as against Poland and Czechoslovakia.
__PRINTERS_P_33_COMMENT__ 2-682 33 frontier in Europe". This aim remained unrealised allegedly owing to "the erroneous assumption that Hitler regarded treaties in the same way that Simon did".^^1^^ What the author calls "depersonified" history later breaks up into a gamut of personal views and personally-motivated actions. "The execution of Barthou's^^2^^ policy now fell into less honest hands. His successor, Pierre Laval, was unscrupulous and deeply suspicious of the Soviet Union,''^^3^^ he writes. The authors of the Appeasement of the Dictators, mentioned earlier, put a slightly different interpretation on the Locarno Pact and its consequences. "Locarno was a great illusion. The most controversial section of the Treaty of Versailles was not settled," they lament. "Locarno acknowledged the right of revision. It was a victory for Germany. Great Britain and France plainly could not agree.... France held to a strict interpretation of the Treaty of Versailles. Britain showed willingness to disregard Eastern Europe as a sphere of interest."^^4^^It is easy to see that the authors are past-masters at verbal sleight-of-hand. The hopes that were placed on a German invasion of the USSR, took the form of Britain's willingness to give up its interests in Eastern Europe. At the same time this assessment of the Locarno Pact admits the fact that British imperialism was the real instigator and in fact the brain behind Germany's preparations for its Eastern campaign.
The responsibility that the capitalist monopolies bore _-_-_
^^1^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory, pp. 140, 141. This assumption was not "erroneous" at all. John Simon, the leader of the right wing of the Liberal Party and foreign secretary in Neville Chamberlain's Cabinet (1931--1935), was consistent in his efforts to incite the Nazi aggressors. He was a bitter opponent of the Soviet Union and tried in every way to exacerbate Anglo-Soviet relations. At the Stresa Conference (April 1935) he opposed all sanctions against Germany, which had violated the Versailles Treaty.
~^^2^^ Louis Barthou, Foreign Minister of France in 1933--1934, supported the idea of signing a Franco-Soviet pact of mutual assistance. Assassinated by Croatian terrorists at the instigation of Berlin and Rome on October 9, 1934.
~^^3^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory, p. 133.
~^^4^^ Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 2.
34 for the war. preparations is carefully camouflaged and nothing is said about the activities in this direction carried out by various financial and industrial groupings which engineered military and political programmes. Defying historical facts the authors claim that "the name 'Cliveden Set'^^1^^ was misleading and there is not the slightest evidence of such'an Anglo-German conspiracy".^^2^^There are many documents refuting this thesis. One of them is a fairly little known report of the German ambassador in London, which clearly shows that Hitler Germany relied on Britain as the main international force in its preparations for war. In March 1935, the German ambassador sent this message to Berlin: "Now that the Reich Government's bold and clear-sighted policy has achieved de facto equality of rights for Germany in the sphere of armaments on land, it will be the task of German statesmanship ... to complete this great achievement... The key to a satisfactory solution is held by Britain.''^^3^^
Many Western historians avoid reference to such documents, since their aim is to exonerate the appeasement policy and actually to invest it with a certain positive content. Dwight E. Lee (USA), for example, claims that this policy was directed at removing the injustice of the Treaty of Versailles with regard to Germany^^4^^. HansAdolf Jacobsen (ERG) contends that "the British and the French were trying to maintain peace at all costs".^^5^^ _-_-_
~^^1^^ Cliveden, an estate of the Astors, the biggest bankers and the most reactionary force on Britain's political scene in the 1930s. The Cliveden Set included the leading members of the conservative governments, including Neville Chamberlain, Lord Halifax, Lord Lothian, etc. This "political salon" was one of the main centres of anti-Soviet, profascist propaganda in Britain, the centre of British-German political dealings on an anti-Soviet basis.
~^^2^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory, p. 190.
~^^3^^ Documents on German Foreign Policy J9J8-1945. Series C, Vol. Ill, United States Government Printing Office, Washington, 1959, p. 1018.
~^^4^^ Munich. Blunder, Plot or Tragic Necessity? Ed. by Dwight E. Lee, B.C.Heath and Company, Lexington, Mass., 1970, p. VII.
~^^5^^ Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Von der Strategic der Gewalt zur Politik der Friedenssicherung. Beitrdge zur deutschen Geschichte in 20. Jahrhundert. Droste Verlag, Dusseldorf, 1977, S. 53.
35 Keith Eubank (USA) who pretends to the role of a pioneer in the interpretation of the causes of the Second World War believes that the activities .of Chamberlain and his entourage "are not without merit".^^1^^ Proceeding from the fatalistic thesis that war could not be averted, Eubank puts out his version that the "appeasers" took no military sanctions against Germany because "this superiority [over Hitler's forces] was not ... obvious to the men who had the responsibility for making decisions".^^2^^ He does not deny that the main vehicle of the policy of appeasement was Britain, but since his task is to whitewash the ruling circles responsible for this policy, its class roots do not bother him much. "Englishmen who looked with favor on the German educational system, on German industrial development, and on German social legislation became appeasement-minded. There was no one man or group of men who can be considered responsible for appeasement,"^^3^^ he writes. In the final analysis this American historian is trying to place the blame on the British and French peoples for the inaction of the British and French ruling circles in the face of the initial aggressive acts by the Germans. "It would have been an arduous-if not an impossible-task to arouse the British and French peoples to fight a war over German soldiers occupying German territory" (reference is to the capture of the Rhineland.-^M^or)^^4^^.Lafore provides a rather strange explanation for the next act of the appeasement policy: the encouragement of the seizure in 1936 of Ethiopia by fascist Italy. "His [Mussolini's] attempts to get Ethiopia led foreigners [sic] to try to outlaw him as an aggressor, and this attempt led in turn to a German-Italian understanding that undermined all future attempts to'stop Hitler'."^^5^^ The American historians question the very right of the Ethiopian people _-_-_
~^^1^^ Keith Eubank, The Origins of World War II, p. VII.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. VIII.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 73.
~^^4^^ Ibid., p. 57.
~^^5^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory, pp. 136--137.
36 to defend the territory of their country, suggesting that the war broke out over some oasis captured by the Italians several years before and situated in a godforsaken desert.^^1^^George W. Baer, Henderson B. Braddick (USA) and some other historians are trying to find out why the Western powers failed to achieve an amicable agreement with Italy at the expense of Ethiopia before Italy took military action. According to Baer, the true reason was Britain's adherence to the principle of "defensive isolationism''.^^2^^ He wrote that "the British government wanted to keep Italy's friendship.... Simon had no special love for Ethiopia, and he did not want to oppose Mussolini. He feared that British resistance would bring about the Duce's fall and leave Italy open to the Bolsheviks".^^3^^ The "red menace" was one of the most persistent stereotypes of bourgeois historiography. Braddick adhered to a somewhat different point of view. Commenting on the Hoare-Laval compact betraying Ethiopia to the Italian aggressors in December 1935, he admits that the agreement "placed a premium on Fascist aggression in Ethiopia."^^4^^ Referring to documents and memoirs, Braddick concludes that British policy was largely responsible for Italy's attack on Ethiopia, since Britain had "straddled" Ethiopia in violation of the agreement of 1906 which had pronounced Ethiopia an Italian sphere of influence. "By the end of 1934, the Italians believed that British influence in the country was becoming so powerful that within a few years they might virtually be forced out."^^5^^ Timid though he was in this, Braddick sought a connection between the policy of Italy's _-_-_
~^^1^^ Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 138. Reference to the attack of Italian troops on an Ethiopian army patrol outside the oasis of Ual Ual, in December 1934.
~^^2^^ George W. Baer, The Coming of the Italian-Ethiopian War. Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1967, p. 91.
~^^3^^ Ibid., pp. 90, 91.
^^4^^ Quoted from Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 33.
^^5^^ Ibid., p. 34. Braddick gives a fuller account of his views in his book Germany, Czechoslovakia and the Grand Alliance in the May Crisis, 1938. University of Denver, Denver, 1 !>(>!).
37 appeasement and the interests of the British monopolies. "The identity of such interests can only be the subject of speculation. But it may be noted that the International Petroleum Cartel, which had controlled roughly 75 per cent of the Italian market since 1928, would certainly be apprehensive about the upsetting effects of an oil sanction.''^^1^^On March 7, 1936, Germany brought its troops into the demilitarised Phineland in contravention of the treaties of Versailles and Locarno. A 30,000-strong German army captured the area without so much as a show of resistance from the Western allies. The capture of the Rhineland was the first aggressive act by Nazi Germany carried out with the use of force and directed specifically against France.
This aggressive act by the Nazis did not escape the attention of a single Western historian. Most of them (except for the neofascists) denounced Germany's actions in one way or another. But their main efforts in the direction of appeasement are aimed at vindicating the policy of Britain and France in the face of German aggression, and exonerating their inaction by a desire to preserve peace and to ward off the "red menace". The Encyclopedia Americana, for example, writes that "Hitler remilitarized the Rhineland in 1936. It was a dangerous venture, for Britain and France could have overwhelmed Germany, but, resolved to keep the peace, they took no action."^^2^^ Lafore puts out essentially the same version by agreeing with the views of the French government ministers in the days of the crisis. In his words, they believed that should France have given an armed rebuff this would have "opened the prospects of both a Franco-German _-_-_
~^^1^^ Quoted from Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 44.
~^^2^^ The Encyclopedia Americana, Vol. 29, American Corporation, New York, 1968, p. 364.
38 war and a German civil war, leading perhaps to either military dictatorship or to communism."^^1^^The question of correlation of forces in the period of the "Rhineland crisis" is a subject for extensive discourse. Unlike the authors of the article in The Encyclopedia Americana, Lafore, for one, claims that Chief of the French General Staff Maurice Gamelin was in possession of information that Germany had one million troops and that one-third of this number had been dispatched to the Rhineland.^^2^^ He is rather doubtful about Britain's ability to wage war.^^3^^ Actually, Britain and France had a combined superiority over Germany in armed forces, the use or non-use of which depended on politicallymotivated decisions.
Bourgeois historians to this day use the old fact-twisting technique of putting the blame upon the peoples and not on their governments which are truly responsible for the criminal policy of encouraging the invaders. We shall see more evidence of this later in this account. This device is often used with regard to the peoples of France and Britain whose governments ostensibly made concessions because the peoples wanted to avoid a conflict with Germany. "The majority of citizens ... feared war more than anything else, and ... thought wisdom and restraint and good intentions could avert it," writes Lafore.^^4^^ Keith Eubank puts the problem still more bluntly: "Opponents of appeasement raised the argument that war should have been started by the Western powers early in the Hitler era when Germany was not yet fully prepared. But the public in Britain and France simply would not have supported such a conflict. People were unwilling to wage war until Hitler forced it on them by attacking Poland."^^5^^ Anti-war sentiment in Britain and France was very _-_-_
~^^1^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory, p. 162.
~^^2^^ Ibidem.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 167.
~^^4^^ Ibid., p. 162.
~^^5^^ Introduction to The Road to World War II. A Documentary History. Ed. by Keith Eubank. Thomas Y. Crowell Company, New York, 1973, p. 6.
39 high, and the working people in these countries demanded that the aggressor be curbed. Suffice it to recall that the programme of the popular front in France sponsored by the Communist, Socialist, Radical, and Republican Socialist parties and overwhelmingly supported by the French working people, had as one of its main provisions the conclusion of a treaty of mutual assistance between states in the struggle against aggression.^^1^^Most of the Western historians conclude that the occupation of the Rhineland by German troops was a crucial point on the road to the Second World War. Commenting on Britain's refusal to honour its obligations under the treaties of Versailles and Locarno, Lafore, nevertheless, speaks approvingly of the British ruling circles who showed understanding of Hitler's anxiety over the "encirclement by Franco-Bolshevism''^^2^^. Many retrospective analyses by Western historians treat the Rhineiand crisis in a way that would discredit the policy of safeguarding peace in Europe which the Soviet Union was consistently pursuing at the time. They draw certain historical analogies in order to give an adverse interpretation to the process of normalisation in the Soviet Union's relations with France, the FRG, and other European capitalist states.
An important element in the prewar complex of events is the "Spanish problem", the Civil War in Spain in 1936--1939- However, most Western analysts, far from disclosing the organic link between the origins of the Civil War in Spain and the preparations by international imperialism for another world war, assiduously try to whitewash fascist aggression and vindicate the Western policy of non-interference. To begin with, they attribute to the instigators of the fascist coup motives that would seem to justify the actions that followed. According to Lafore, they sought to "save the proud name of Spain and the security of the privileged classes from the threat _-_-_
~^^1^^ See A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 2, Moscow, 1974, pp. 226--227 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Laurence Lafore, The End of Glory, p. 160.
40 of social change".^^1^^ The invasion of Spain by Nazi Germany and fascist Italy is interpreted not as the result of aggressive and counter-revolutionary plans and of the reactionary imperialist policy of these states which were encouraged by the ruling quarters of Britain, France and the USA, but as the result of Mussolini's "mixture of impetuosity and a sort of cynicism which was as often as not based on unrealities''.^^2^^This encouragement of fascist aggression is interpreted, like in the case of the seizure of the Rhineland, as the desire of Britain, France and the USA to preserve peace. "Blum (the head of the French government-Author) himself understood clearly enough the nature of the Fascist and Nazi regimes.... He believed, however, that any policy of open support for the Spanish Republic might well cause ... a general war in Europe.''^^3^^
Lafore draws two conclusions from the events in Spain: first, Italy and Germany gave the whole world "a show of overwhelming strength",^^4^^ secondly, it was Britain, or more precisely, the Chamberlain government that was calling the tune in European politics, since it "has made agreement with Germany one of the major points of its program".^^5^^
The first conclusion does not hold water, because at that time, and especially in 1936--1938, Germany and Italy were weaker, both militarily and economically, than Britain and France. As for the second conclusion, the American historian, in pointing out the leading role of the British ruling circles in endearing Hitler Germany to Britain, passes over in silence the goals that the proposed agreement was expected to achieve, and fails to mention the countries at whose expense it was to be concluded.
Another typical feature of the interpretation of the appeasement policy by bourgeois historians is their vague _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., p. 170.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 171.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 173.
~^^4^^ Ibid., p. 172.
~^^5^^ Ibid., p. 188.
41 conclusions or even a mere listing of aggressive acts. An official account of the Second World War prepared by the Office of the Chief of Military History of the United States Army offers the following interpretation of the developments that preceded the outbreak of the Second World War; "The German annexation of Austria in March 1938 followed by the Czech crisis in September of the same year awakened the United States and the other democratic nations to the imminence of another great world conflict. The new conflict had already begun in the Far East when Japan had invaded China in 1937."^^1^^The seizure of Austria by the Nazis is more often than not mentioned as a fait accompli, or as the expression of the will of the Austrian people.^^2^^ The entire history of Anschluss which had been forbidden by the Treaty of Versailles, is given but very scanty treatment even in such a highly specialised study as Appeasement of the Dictators, devoted wholly to the diplomatic aspects of the German policy of the Western powers in 1933--1938. The only passing mention on this point comes from Henderson Braddick, who says that Nazi penetration into Austria was regarded in London as a factor that "would accentuate Italian dependence on England".^^3^^
However, every time an attempt is made to justify the inaction of Britain, France and the United States vis-a-vis Nazi expansion, the selfsame "argument of fear" comes into play. "Europe was stunned, but no country dared risk war to compel Germany's withdrawal,"^^4^^ reads an official American publication.
William L. Shirer, who is more critical of the British and French position on the question of the Anschluss, _-_-_
~^^1^^ American Military History. Washington, 1969, p. 417.
~^^2^^ On April 10, 1938, a referendum was held in Austria. The citizens were to answer this question: "Do you agree to the reunification of Austria with the German Empire? "In the conditions of unrestrained Nazi propaganda and terror, and also as the result of outright ballotrigging, the answer was overwhelmingly "yes".
~^^3^^ Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 37.
~^^4^^ The World at War 1939--1944. A Brief History of World War II. The Infantry Journal, Inc. Washington, 1945, p. 34.
42 points out that alongside the strategic and economic dividends which the aggressors had from the seizure of Austria, "perhaps most important to Hitler was the demonstration again that neither Britain nor France would lift a finger to stop him".^^1^^ This statement, however, is misleading. Fingers were lifted, and all possible strings pulled, only it was to support fascist aggression. Here is a typical example. Soon after the seizure of Austria by Nazi Germany, the French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet met the German Ambassador Johannes von Welczeck (May 25, 1938). Georges Bonnet "emphasised that the French government highly appreciates the sincere efforts being undertaken by the German government for the benefit of peace (sic)...''.^^2^^ In those days the governments of Britain, France, Germany and Italy were, with American support, hatching a new crime against peace: the Munich collusion over the division of Czechoslovakia. That opened the way for the fascist advance on the East and the outbreak of the Second World War.The veil of silence over the actual goals of the policy of appeasement is raised very rarely. For example, Braddick makes the following remark to the effect that having "protected" themselves with a naval agreement with Germany^^3^^ the British ruling quarters thought that the "German dynamism" should now be channelled to the east and the southeast.^^4^^ The French historian Jean-Baptiste Duroselle writes: "Rampant anti-communism in France, the French government's fear of losing its lesser allies in _-_-_
^^1^^ William L. Shirer, The Collapse of the Third Republic. An Inquiry Into the Fall of France in 1940. William Heinemann, London, 1970, p. 311.
~^^2^^ Documents diplomatiques franfais. 1932--7939. 2e serie, Tome IX. Imprimerie nationale, Paris, 1974, p. 924.
~^^3^^ The Anglo-German naval agreement (June 18, 1935) established the proportional naval strength of the two countries. It formally limited the overall tonnage of the German navy with a ratio of 35: 100 as against the British navy, but in actual fact gave the go-ahead to further Nazi violations of the limits on the armed forces established by the Treaty of Versailles for Germany, and encouraged its rearmament.
~^^4^^ Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 37.
43 the East did their job. Franco-Soviet relations were rapidly deteriorating."^^1^^What should Anglo-French policy have been, according to bourgeois historians? Remarkable in this respect is Baer"s point of view on the Italo-Ethiopian conflict. He believes that Mussolini should have been appeased either "by the peaceful cession of territory in east Africa, parts of Ethiopia or British Somaliland, or by the peaceful economic penetration of Ethiopia with British and French cooperation"^^2^^. In other words, the policy of encouragement of the fascist aggressors was quite in order. The qualified criticisms by these historians of the policy of abetment are limited to certain aspects and even these are modified by suggestions for what would have been more "rational" solutions. Whatever they write about, be it the seizure of Austria by the Nazis, or Japan's aggression in China, or any other acts of aggression, their logic does not go beyond the interests and goals of the ruling quarters of the conflicting imperialist groupings. The d.estinies of the people seems to be the least concern of these historians. This is the first typical feature of bourgeois historiography. The second feature is its anti-Sovietism.
There is not a single event in prewar international affairs that reactionary historians did not try to attribute to "Moscow's scheming", and to use as a pretext for casting doubts on the efforts of the USSR to curb fascist aggression.
For example, the SovL Union put in - a great deal of effort to safeguard the independence of Austria, which the Nazis eventually seized in March 1938- Back in the autumn of 1937, the Soviet newspaper Pravda wrote: "The preservation of Austria's independence calls for a swift and ^united action by all countries interested in assuring European security. Only these actions can hold back the aggressor and prevent the creation of a new hotbed of war."^^3^^ The Austrian historian Wilfried Aichinger _-_-_
~^^1^^ Jean-Baptiste Duroselle, La decadence 1932-J939. Imprimerie nationale. Paris, 1979, p. 3'2'2.
~^^2^^ George W. Baer, The Coming of the Italian-Ethiopian War. p. 93.
~^^3^^ Pravda, September 28, 1937. 44
44 claims that the Soviet Union's efforts to prevent Austria's annexation failed because the USSR had isolated itself in the international arena by its policy bent on "world revolution".^^1^^What was the real situation? The Soviet government never recognised the seizure of Austria in whatever form. The Soviet Union was the only great power to brand with shame this act of aggression and again called for collective efforts to stem the onsjaught of German nazism, to forestall the Nazi-fostered menace of a new world war., "To-morrow it may already be late, but today there is still time for all nations, and especially the great powers, to take a firm and unequivocal stand on the problem of saving peace by collective effort," the Soviet government declared on March 17, 1938.^^2^^ Austria lost her independence at that time not because the USSR "sought to accomplish a world revolution" but because Britain, France and the United States did not heed the warning from the Soviet Union and, in fact, pretended that they did not even notice that a whole European state had vanished from the map. It was Britain, France and the United States that openly encouraged Nazi Germany to swallow up independent Austria.
The Soviet Union alerted world-wide opinion against the Italian invasion of Ethiopia, gave all possible assistance, including military, to China in its fight against the Japanese invaders, and to republican Spain in its war against the fascist insurgents and the Italo-German aggressors.
The current interpretation of the Munich agreement signed by Britain, France, Germany and Italy with American approval, is angled to make the Soviet Union seem to _-_-_
~^^1^^ Wilfried Aichinger, Sowjetische Osterreichpolitic 1943--1945. Osterreichische Gesellschaft fur Zeitgeschichte, Wien, 1977, S. 16.
~^^2^^ USSR-Austria. Documents and Materials. Moscow, 1980, pp. 14--15 (in Russian).
45 be responsible for the capitulation of the Western "democracies". The compiler of materials of that period in a book called Munich concedes that the very word "Munich" "has apparently become firmly fixed in our vocabulary as a symbol of shameful surrender to the bullying tactics of an aggressor".^^1^^ He admits that according to a widely accepted opinion, the British and French governments "deliberately planned or plotted the Munich settlement in order to turn Hitler eastward towards Soviet Russia".^^2^^ However, most of the authors of the book disagree with this view. The arguments used by these historians are utterly untenable, and their inventions about the Soviet Union being ultimately responsible for the conclusion of the Munich deal boil down to the allegation that the Soviet government had not informed the Czechoslovak government "in time" that it was prepared to honour the Soviet-Czechoslovak treaty and to render Czechoslovakia military assistance in the event of Nazi aggression. For example, Eubank says that the Soviet government replied to President Benes on this question after the expiry of the Anglo-French ultimatum presented to Czechoslovakia.^^3^^ Duroselle takes a more critical view of the Munich deal. He writes: "The enthusiasm over the rescue of peace very soon fizzled out even in those who supported Munich.... And just as soon, the majority of the French people woke up to the fact that France had capitulated." He calls Soviet policy "enigmatic" because, in his words, "when the crisis was at its peak the Soviet position was on the whole clear, although it was still anybody's guess as to how the Czechs could possibly be assisted."^^4^^Let us recall some facts in the history of that period. The inquiry that Benes made on September 19 was studied by the Central Committee Political Bureau of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and a reply _-_-_
~^^1^^ Introduction to Munich. Blunder, Plot, or Tragic Necessity?, p. VII.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. IX.
~^^3^^ Keith Eubank, Munich. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1963, pp. 150--151.
~^^4^^ Jean-Baptiste Duroselle, La decadence 1932--1939. pp. 357, 354.
46 message sent to BeneS in Prague the next day. The Soviet Union stated that it was prepared to render assistance to Czechoslovakia even if France defaulted on its commitments.^^1^^The decisive events related to the Munich deal occurred in late September, when BeneS already knew the Soviet government's position. "I never doubted, even for a moment, that the Soviet Union would, if necessary, give us assistance in one way or another,"^^2^^ he wrote later.
George F. Kennan referred to the Munich pact as "the cession to Germany of ... areas of predominantly Germanspeaking population..."^^3^^ He also comes up with the version that if the USSR really wanted to help Czechoslovakia, it would have needed "approximately three months"^^4^^ to dispatch just one division. Such assessments do not hold water since by that time the Soviet aimed forces were able to airlift large and small army units over long distances.
Loyal to its solidarity with the working people of Czechoslovakia and to its commitments under the SovietCzechoslovak treaty, the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the Soviet Government put the Soviet armed forces on full alert in order to render armed assistance to the Czechoslovak people. A large number of troops were moved to the western borders of the USSR. On September 28, four air force brigades (eight air force regiments) totalling 548 aircraft were readied for dispatch to Czechoslovakia, of which the French military attache in the USSR, Colonel Palasse, and the Czechoslovak government were duly informed. However, the BeneS-Hodza government betrayed their own people and opted for surrender to the Nazis, thus preventing the _-_-_
~^^1^^ See New Documents on the Munich Development. Moscow, 1958, pp. 98--105 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Edouard Benes. Ou vont les slaves? Editions de Notre Temps, Paris, 1948, p. 212.
~^^3^^ George F. Kennan, From Prague after Munich. Diplomatic Papers 1938--1940. Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1968, p. XIII.
~^^4^^ Quoted from Appeasement of the Dictators, p. 110.
47 Soviet Union from helping the Czechoslovak people in the hour 'of need. The Hitlerites moved into Czechoslovakia, occupied it and split the country into several parts. The Soviet troops stayed on the western border of the USSR untQ October 25, 1938, and were then returned to their permanent bases.^^1^^Reactionary historians are bent on absolving the Western powers of the responsibility for the anti-Soviet policy of appeasement of the fascist aggressor which led to the Second World War. Keith Eubank complains that Britain and France carried the burden of shame for the policies of those days for much too long.^^2^^ However, even falsification of the facts will not exonerate the past. It was the Munich deal that opened the road to the Second World War, and actually presented the Soviet Union with a fait accompli: there was now an anti-Soviet bloc of imperialist powers.
The first and main hotbed of the Second World War was in Europe, and the second was in Asia where Japan was mounting its aggression.
The International Military Tribunal pronounced the Japanese rulers guilty of the deliberate launching of aggressive wars, also of the mass murder of civilians and prisoners of war, and of other crimes against humanity. However, in the course of the trial in Tokyo, which lasted from May 1946 to November 1948, certain Japanese and American lawyers were trying to vindicate those responsible for starting the war, and absolve the Japanese imperialists of their crimes. This tendency continued in later years as well. Many Western historians do their utmost to conceal the fact that before the war the imperialists of the United States and Great Britain prodded Japan to move against the USSR, whereas Japanese _-_-_
^^1^^ A history of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. '2, pp. 106--109.
~^^2^^ Keith Eubank, The Origins of World War II, p. VIII.
48 reactionary historians tried to whitewash their own monopolies and the military, who were responsible for aggression in East and Southeast Asia.One such effort is the 96-volume Official History of the War in Great East Asia^^1^^ published in 1966--1976 by the Department of National Defence of Japan. According to Professor Saito Takashi, Chairman of the Japanese Committee on the History of the Second World War, this book amounts to a justification of the aggressive war waged by Japan.^^2^^ The Official History describes the preparations by the Japanese General Staff for aggression against the Soviet Union as "activities directed at repulsing aggression by the Soviets".^^3^^ The falsifiers of history are trying to whitewash the Japanese armed forces which perpetrated acts of mass brutality in the occupied territories. An observer of the magazine Gunji kenkuy, Morino Hayato tries to convince the reader that the Japanese soldiers were allegedly moved by purely patriotic motives, since they believed that they were waging a sacred war and were liberating the peoples of Asia in order to make them happy and prosperous.^^4^^
The concept of the Japanese military historian Hattori Takushiro boils down to the idea that Japan's plans to attack the Soviet Union were nothing but an attempt to ensure Japan's own security against the Soviet Union from positions of strength.^^5^^ Kojima Noboru, claiming to "bring out the true meaning of the war of 19411945", tries to convince his readers that Japan was forced to take aggressive actions.^^6^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Daitoa senso kokan sen shi. (An Official History of the War in Great East Asia). Tokyo, 1966--1976.
~^^2^^ Saito Takashi, Japanese Historiography of the Second World War. A paper read at the Second Soviet-Japanese symposium of historians. November 1975, p. '2 (verbatim report).
^^3^^ Daitoa senso kokan sen shi. Vol. 20, Tokyo, 1968, Part 2, pp. 14--17.
~^^4^^ See Gunji kenkuy (Military Review), Tokyo, 1976, No. 6, p. 26.
~^^5^^ Takushiro Hattori, Japan in the War, 1941--1945. Moscow, 1973, p. 46 (translation into Russian).
~^^6^^ Kojima Noboru, Taiheye senso (The War in the Pacific). Vol. 1, Tokyo, 1966, p. 3.
49Such ideas clearly show that many bourgeois ideologists in Japan are even today trying to bring back to life the old arguments and slogans of anti-communism and panAsianism. They say, among other things, that in the 1930s and 1940s the Asian peoples had some sort of spiritual and socio-political affinity which necessitated their political integration under the aegis of Japan as the most economically advanced nation in this part of the world.
In actual fact, Japan, which had embarked upon the road of independent national development earlier than other Asian countries, was not in the least concerned about any partnership with her neighbours. "In Asia itself the conditions for the most complete development of commodity production and the freest, widest and speediest growth of capitalism have been created only in Japan, i.e., only in an independent national state," wrote Lenin in 1914. This means that Japan was "a bourgeois state, and for that reason has itself begun to oppress other nations and to enslave colonies".^^1^^
In Japanese plans to redivide the world by force of arms China was the prune objective. In 1931, Japan brought her troops into Manchuria and in this way turned it into a colony, and a vantage ground for further aggressive expansion into China and for preparing war against the USSR. In the summer of 1937, at the second stage of aggression, the Japanese militarists dispatched a 100,000-strong army. tb Shanghai and launched an offensive in the north of China.
The governments of the United States, Britain and France made no attempt to curb Japan's expansionism, since it provided an opportunity for suppressing the revolutionary movement in China and for attacking the Soviet Union. Japan's aggression in China was supported by the American imperialists who at the same time made a show of sympathy with the struggle of the Chinese people.
American historians make a lengthy study of U.S. policy for China. However, their interpretations of this policy _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "The Right of Nations to Self-Determination", Collected Works, Vol. 20, 1977, p. 399.
50 more often than not run counter to its substance. Dorothy Borg, for example, writes that "Americans had a deep and idealistic attachment to China which was not to be found among other peoples...''.^^1^^ To bear out this point she refers to the Nine-Power Treaty concluded in Washington in 1922 on U.S. initiative "guaranteeing China's territorial integrity and independence, and equal commercial opportunity for all nations''.^^2^^ Borg gives the United States the most credit for the fact that this agreement was signed because "the Chinese, subjected to defeat and humiliation, were in great need of encouragement".^^3^^ The Nine-Power Treaty signed by the participants in the Washington Conference made it binding, in words at least, upon its signatories to respect the territorial and administrative integrity of China, to observe "the principle of equal opportunity for the commerce and industry of all nations throughout the territory of China...''.^^4^^ However, its true meaning was to formalise the collusion of the imperialist powers to rob China, with the United States putting itself in a position where it could crowd its imperialist rivals out of China and grab the lion's share of the loot. This inevitably exacerbated the imperialist contradictions in Asia, especially between the United States and Japan.The results of the predatory policy of the United States vis-a-vis China became evident quite soon. The main silver reserves which backed the yuan (the main monetary unit in China) migrated to the United States, thus pushing the already weak Chinese economy to the brink of disaster. The policy of condoning Japan's aggression in China, and the efforts to direct this aggression against the USSR are often misrepresented as attempts to prevent deterioration of relations between the USA _-_-_
^^1^^ Quoted from America and the Origins of World War II, 1933--1941. Ed. by Arnold A. Offner, Houghton, Mifflin Company, Boston, 1971, p. 28.
~^^2^^ Ibidem.
~^^3^^ Ibidem.
^^4^^ Conference on the Limitation of Armament. Washington, November 12, 1921-February 6, 1922, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1922, p. 1624.
51 and Japan.^^1^^ Japan's seizure of Manchuria and later of North China, with no protest from the United States, is interpreted as a desire of the American government to stay neutral in the conflict and follow "the moral principles of American policy". This is how Borg explains the American actions. "Hull deliberately refrained from stating which party- was the aggressor in the conflict in the Far East and insisted that he was adhering to a policy of 'strict impartiality'." In her words, these actions amounted to an effort "to avoid any situation which might result in the United States government's having to take a stronger stand against Japan".^^2^^ Borg voices her disapproval over American policy: "The degree of passivity which the United States government maintained is the feature of our record in the Far East in the mid-1930's that is most likely to seem astonishing in retrospect."^^3^^ And 'this thesis is shared by many American historians. But the emphasis on passivity is in itself questionable. What is clear, however, is that in its desire to use the Japanese military machine as a striking force against both the USSR and the national liberation movement in China, the United States not only supplied Japan with strategic materials but also kept increasing the volume of these deliveries. Over the first six months before the war in China the Americans stepped up their exports to Japan by 83 per cent. In 1937--1939 the United States exported 511 million dollars worth of materiel and strategic materials (70 per cent of U.S. exports to that country).^^4^^ There was obviously a certain connection between the growing American assistance to Japan and the intensity of Japan's aggressive actions against the USSR. In 1939, Japan was allowed to buy ten times more scrap iron in the United States than in the year before. The United States sold Japan three million dollars worth of the latest machine tools for her aircraft manufacturing industry. "If anybody were to follow the Japanese armies in China, and see _-_-_^^1^^ America and the Origins of World War II, p. 39.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 43, 45.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 54.
~^^4^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 2; p. 40.
52 for himself the mass of American equipment they have, he might well think it was the American army that he was following,"^^1^^ wrote the then U.S. trade attache in China. This fact and many others disclose the true meaning of the policy of isolationism and show that American policy in Asia was far from passive. It was, indeed, a very active colonial policy. American encouragement of Japanese aggression against the USSR did produce much of the expected results.After signing the Anti-Comintern Pact with Germany and Italy, the Japanese rulers, with the encouragement of the United States, Britain and France, carried out a military attack on the USSR in the area of Lake Hasan in 1938. A year later they repeated this act of aggression on the banks of the River Knalkhin Gol in the Mongolian People's Republic.
Right after the signing of an agreement on the cessation of hostilities on the Manchurian-Mongolian border, on September 1,5, 1939, the Army General Staff and the war ministry of Japan, acting jointly with the Naval General Staff and the Command of the Kwantung Army and the Japanese expeditionary corps in China, proceeded to develop a new strategic plan of war against the Soviet Union which was scheduled for 1940. The aim of this operation was "to rout the Russian army disposed in the Far East, to seize territories east of the town of Rukhlovo and the Great Khingan Mountains". After that the Japanese militarists planned to occupy areas east of Lake Baikal, also the northern part of the island of Sakhalin and the Kamchatka Peninsula.^^2^^
Looking back to the Japano-Soviet relations of that period some Japanese historians and statesmen try to prove that the neutrality pact which Japan concluded with the Soviet Union on April 13, 1941, was "defensive in substance".^^3^^ American historians also try to whitewash Japan's foreign policy. In an article entitled "Japan Between Moscow and Berlin (1941--1945)" Arnold Krammer seeks to _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., p. 42.
^^2^^ See: Voyenno-istorichc'iky zhurnal CI i e Journal of Military History), 197(>, No. 9, p. 94.
^^3^^ See: Kase Toshikazu, Dainiji sekai ta.sen hisshi (The Secret History of the Second World War). Tokyo, 1958, p 92.
53 prove that the Japanese government had no aggressive intentions with regard to the USSR. At the same time Krammer says nothing about the fact that Tokyo, in spite of the neutrality pact, was feverishly preparing for an attack on the USSR, and that only the rout of Nazi Germany failed this plan.^^1^^ Numerous documents that later came to light show precisely that the Tokyo rulers were intending to use this pact as a cover-up for the preparations to seize the Soviet Far East and Siberia.^^2^^ The so-called Kantokuen plan, drawn up by the Japanese General Staff soon after the beginning of the Nazi aggression against the USSR, provided for routing Soviet troops in the Maritime Region in the Far East and for capturing Khabarovsk. In the spring of the next year the Japanese troops were to continue their advance from Khabarovsk westward and northward.Under this plan, Japan was to start the war on August 29, 1941. On July 5, the General Staff and the war ministry prepared Directive No. 101 on mobilisation. On July 7, the Emperor sanctioned such a mobilisation. Soon after, on July 11, the High Military Command issued Directive No. 506 "On Intensification of Preparations for War Against Russia".^^3^^
But the developments on the Soviet-German front foiled the designs of the Japanese militarists. On September 4, 1941 the German ambassador to Tokyo, General Ott, wrote in a dispatch to Ribbentrop: "In view of the resistance put up by the Russian Army to the German Army, the Japanese General Staff is doubtful that Germany would turn the scales in the war against Russia before the onset of winter. Besides, the events of the Khalkhin Gol are still fresh in the memory of the Kwantung Army."^^4^^ These developments caused a turnabout in Japan's military policy: priority was given to the seizure of the American colonies in the Pacific, putting off the attack on the USSR until a later date.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Revue d'histoire de la deuxieme guerre mondiale, No. 103, July, 1976, pp. 1-11.
~^^2^^ See: A History of the Second World War 1939--1945, Vol. 3, 1974, pp. 354--355; Vol. 4, 1975, p. 189--193.
~^^3^^ See: Voyenno-istorichesky zhurnal, 1976, No. 9, p. 95.
^^4^^ Japanese Militarism (A Military-Historical Study), Moscow, 1972, p. 179 (in Russian).
54This is how the embers of war were being rekindled, soon to burst into a world-wide conflagration.
Bourgeois historians give a negative answer to this question. Marxist historians, by contrast, believe that in the years preceding the Second World War, there was real possibility to preserve peace. This they explain by a number of reasons, such as the growing political and defence capability of the USSR, its peaceful policy, also by the rising communist, revolutionary-democratic and national liberation movements in the world, by the mass actions of the working class and the wide segments of the population in defence of peace.
The view that war was imminent and that nothing could prevent it was common back in the 1930s, especially among the petty bourgeoisie and Social-Democracy. This view which played into the hands of the forces of aggression and war was sharply criticised at the Seventh Congress of the Comintern in 1935. In his speech, the Soviet representative D.Z.Manuilsky said: "The Communists must abandon the fatalistic view that it is impossible to prevent the outbreak of war, that it is useless fighting against war preparationsa view that arose from the hitherto extremely limited dimensions of the anti-war movement."^^1^^ In his report to the Seventh Comintern Congress, which he made on behalf of the Central Committee of the Communist International, Wilhelm Pieck said: "We are convinced that war can be averted by a joint struggle for peace waged by the proletariat of the capitalist countries and the Soviet Union.''^^2^^
In the years preceding the Second World War, the Soviet Union was working hard to curb imperialist aggression, and warned that it could grow into a global conflict. In its political report to the 16th Party Congress (1930), the Central _-_-_
^^1^^ VII Congress of the Communist International, p. 540.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 69.
55 Committee of the CPSU pointed out that the bourgeoisie was prepared to unleash a world war in order "to resolve one contradiction of capitalism or another, or all the contradictions taken together, at the expense of the USSR". The plan for collective security put forward by the CPSU in 1933 and the concerted efforts of all forces opposed to fascism could have prevented the outbreak of the war.The Communist Party and the Soviet Government believed that peace was indivisible and that collective effort was needed to safeguard peace. The Soviet Union believed that a system of collective security could be created, that it could preserve world peace, that this system was acceptable not only to the Soviet state, but also to those of the capitalist countries which did not want another war. In 1933--1935, the Soviet Union made a number of clear-cut proposals on disarmament, and joined the League of Nations. It also signed treaties of mutual assistance with France and Czechoslovakia, which were to become part of a broader agreement directed at strengthening peace in Europe ("The Eastern Pact"). But Britain, France and Poland blocked the conclusion of such an agreement. Nevertheless, Soviet diplomacy took every opportunity to promote the cause of peace. The government of the USSR conclu ded non-aggression pacts with a number of states. It also signed a convention with the neighbouring countries on the definition of aggression.
The Soviet Union proposed signing a Pacific regional pact that it hoped would prevent war m the Far East. President Roosevelt at first took an understanding view of the Soviet proposal. Later, however, the governments of the United States, Britain and China declined to sign such a pact. In 193.5-1939 the Soviet Union, in spite of the fact that it was surrounded by capitalist states, came out in defence of the first victims of the aggressors, the peoples of China, Ethiopia, Spain, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Albania, and carried on with its p'.-ace efforts in the diplomatic arena.
[56] __ALPHA_LVL2__ A STREAM OF LIESArguments used to prove that nothing could ward off the Second World War are mainly built on the events of the last several months before its outbreak, specifically the AngloFranco-Soviet negotiations and, when these came to naught through the fault of the Western powers, the conclusion of the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Treaty. What was behind the events of that period?
The political and military negotiations between the USSR, Britain and France in April-August 1939 (Moscow talks) hold a special place in the long epic of the Soviet Union's struggle for a collective security system to curb fascist aggression and prevent a second world war. This can be explained by the following reasons. In the first place, these talks were held in a critical situation when Germany was on the point of starting a war, and their outcome would have been largely responsible for the future of peace in Europe and for the balance of forces in the event of hostilities. Second, the talks were solidly based on the concrete Soviet proposal for creating a military and political alliance between the USSR, Britain and France that would ensure peace and safeguard the vital interests of all nations opposed to fascist aggression. Should the Western powers have taken a more realistic stand on the Soviet proposal, the prospects for averting the Second World War would have been much better; the rejection of this plan made a second world war imminent.
The history of the Moscow talks is part of the diametrically opposite concepts of the origins of the Second World War, and it continues to attract the attention of both Marxist and bourgeois scholars. The Marxist studies give an objective and exhaustive picture of the history of the Moscow talks and show that the British and French governments, owing to their class positions and their desire to draw the USSR into 57 a war with Germany, declined to conclude a treaty with the Soviet Union. Finally, when Germany's attack on Poland was just a few days away, they led the talks into an impasse. "It was quite clear that the talks with the Soviet Union, just like the guarantees to Poland and other countries, are regarded by Britain only as a reserve plan to pressure the Nazis into a bargain with them," says a Soviet study on the Moscow talks. "It was with this purpose in mind that the British and French engaged in talks on a military convention. They hoped that by doing so they would make Hitler more compliant in his talks with Britain."^^1^^ Disclosing the class roots of the Anglo-French policy, which was actively supported by ruling quarters in the United States, the Soviet historians point out that "by acting in their most treacherous manner, the Western powers tried in every way possible to make Hitler understand that the Soviet Union had no allies, and that Hitler could attack first Poland, and then the USSR without risking opposition from Britain and France"^^2^^.
The Soviet studies show that the Communist Party and the Soviet Government, with Soviet diplomats, were working hard for a treaty of mutual assistance with Britain andFrance. They also point out that by carrying on with their peaceful policy, "the main principle of which was the thesis that peace was indivisible, the USSR did its utmost to unite the efforts of all peace loving slates in order to promote peace and curb fascist aggression"^^3^^.
The more reactionary historians give a rather eclectic interpretation to the Moscow talks. For one thing, they put a distinctly anti-Soviet complexion on these talks. However, owing to exhaustive research by Marxist and other progressive historians a growing degree of fairness is observed in assessments of the Moscow talks. Jacques Bariety, Director of the Institute of Contemporary History at Strasbourg University, writes, for example, that the Soviet Union "was quite serious about these crucial negotiations". But, he continues, _-_-_
~^^1^^ A History of the Foreign Policy of the USSR, 1917--1945. Moscow, 1980, p. 379 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 2, p. 150.
^^3^^ Europe Through International Relations. Moscow, 1979, p. 380 (in Russian).
58 the USSR "was profoundly distrustful of the genuine desire of the West to sign an agreement with it"^^1^^. What the Western countries were sadly lacking in was that "genuine desire" Bari6ty was talking about. An even more unequivocal assessment to this effect was made by Professor Lothar Kettenacker, who said that "if London had on April 18 immediately and without subterfuge stated its unqualified readiness to accept the Soviet proposals for an alliance and had taken a more serious view of the principle of collective security in Europe, the 'front of peace' would probably have been formed. This background to the situation forced Churchill, on June 22, 1941, the day of the German offensive in the East, to stretch out his hand to the USSR with the offer of such an alliance"^^2^^.The transcripts of the meetings of the Foreign Relations Committee of the British Cabinet held on June 9 and June 20, 1939, are very revealing in that they shed light on the positions of the Western powers at the Moscow talks. They show, in the first place, that the British government was not only well informed, but in fact was sure that the Soviet Union was fully prepared to sign a trilateral agreement; secondly, that the British government was clearly aware that the success or failure of these talks meant the difference between peace and war; third, the British government's "negotiations game" created "the formidable danger" of an agreement between Germany and the USSR.
The architects of the policy of abetting the aggressors against the USSR actually said at these meetings:
Chamberlain: "The Russians had every intention of reaching an agreement but wished to get the best possible terms.''^^3^^ Halifax: "Information from many different sources points to the necessity of reaching an agreement with Russia, as otherwise Hitler might well be encouraged to take some _-_-_
^^1^^ Le Monde. August 25, 1976, p. 3.
~^^2^^ Lothar Kettenacker, Die Diplomatic der Ohmnacht. Die gescheiterte Friedensstrategie der britischen Regierung vor Ausbruch des Zweiten Weltkrieges.-Sommer 1939. Die GroBmachte der Europaische Krieg. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1979, S. 268.
^^3^^ Public Record Office (PRO). F.O. 371/23071, p. 240.
59 violent action"^^1^^. Halifax also noted that by reaching an agreement with Russia the allies could protect themselves for a time from an even more formidable danger---the likely agreement between Germany and Russia, and could ensure Poland's security. He went on to note, "it seemed clear that Russia was anxious to secure the maintenance of Poland's independence and had no wish to see Poland destroyed"^^2^^.Chamberlain., Halifax and Wilson stated some obvious truths, but they took an entirely opposite course which clearly reflected the desire of the ruling quarters of Britain, France and the United States to use the Moscow talks as a means of putting pressure on Germany. The architects of the Munich policy hoped, by betraying Poland, to channel the German troops towards the USSR and in this way let fascist aggression "take its own course". As a matter of fact the British Prime Minister did not even try to conceal these plans from his entourage. In his view, if Poland and other countries to whom Britain and France had given "guarantees" did not receive their aid (which is exactly what happened), "there was a likelihood that they would be rapidly overrun and that Germany would then be on the Russian frontiers"^^3^^.
The Moscow talks were being closely watched by the British Cabinet and its numerous committees and subcommittees which resorted to stalling tactics in order to scuttle the talks ostensibly through the fault of the USSR^^4^^. Each time a new version of a treaty with the USSR came up for discussion, the British leaders made it quite clear that, in the event of a German attack on the USSR, they would default on their commitments, and leave the Soviet Union fighting single-handed against the fascist coalition.
_-_-_^^1^^ PRO, P.O. 371/23071, p. 240.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 42.
^^3^^ PRO, F.O. 371/23071, p. 5O.
^^4^^ A History of Diplomacy. Vol. Ill, Moscow, 1965, pp. 759--792 (in Russian).
60 Steering the other members of the Cabinet along this course of action Lord Halifax said on June 21, 1939: "If, for example, the Russian government sought to keep this country fighting for some fantastic object, common sense would ... reassert itself'^^1^^. Building up an anti-Soviet atmosphere around the talks, Chamberlain insisted that whatever concerned an alliance with Russia filled him with foreboding, and that he had no faith in Russia's stability and doubted her ability to help her allies in the event of war.He said a treaty with the USSR would be "a millstone around our necks for years and might result in our sons being called upon to fight for Russian interests"^^2^^. He was echoed by obedient ministers. Lord Chatfield, the Minister for Coordination of Defence, who was directly responsible for the activities of the British delegation at the Moscow talks, expressed the hope that his colleagues would understand with what aversion he was forced to view the possibility of an alliance with the Soviets^^3^^.
By the middle of July, Britain and France had brought the talks to a stalemate. The British government agreed to the principle of mutual assistance between the three powers, but then wrecked the crucial part of the talks on the granting of guarantees by the three powers to the Baltic countries by objecting to such guarantees extending to cases of indirect aggression, like that which had shortly before, in March 1939, happened in Czechoslovakia, whose territory was occupied bv German troops with the consent of President Hacha. In the conditions when the Baltic countries were ruled by pro-fascist governments, such security guarantees were of major significance for the safety of the USSR and for halting German aggression in time. However, the British government rejected the Soviet proposals.
Meanwhile the threat of war in Europe was growing rapidly. The clear-cut position of the Soviet Union at the Moscow talks was increasingly supported by broad segments of the population in Britain and France, and by sober-minded men _-_-_
^^1^^ PRO. Cab. 23/ 100 p. 5.
^^2^^ PRO. Cab. 23/99, pp. 275--276.
^^3^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 2, p. 140.
61 in the ruling elite of these countries. A public opinion poll taken in the autumn of 1938 showed that 57 per cent of the French people approved the Munich agreement against 37 per cent (with the others abstaining). In the summer of the next year, 76 per cent of those polled favoured the use of force in the event of Germany attacking Poland and 81 per cent favoured an alliance of France and Britain with the Soviet . Union^^1^^. The leader of the British Communists Harry Pollitt wrote in July 1939: "...eighty seven out of every hundred people in Britain want a pact with the Soviet Union. Why? Because, above everything else, they want to prevent war, and understand that the most effective way of doing so is to join forces with a great and powerful country which has proved time and time again during the past crucial years that it has no warlike plans and is prepared to come wholeheartedly to the side of its allies in any system of collective security if they are attacked by the mad dogs of fascism".^^2^^On July 25 the Anglo-French side agreed to adopt a Soviet proposal on holding talks with a view to signing a military convention. In spite of this consent by the British, the political guidelines of Chamberlain and his entourage at the talks which took place in Moscow between August 12 and 21, 1939, remained unchanged. By decision of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Ail-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) the Soviet military mission was headed by Marshal of the Soviet Union Kliment Voroshilov, People's Commissar of Defence. The Soviet delegation was not only instructed to conduct talks, but also to sign a military convention with Britain and France against aggression in Europe. The military missions of Britain and France were, made up of persons of secondary status (the British mission was headed by Admiral Drax, and the French mission by a member of the Military Council, General Doumenc) who had no powers to sign a military agreement. _-_-_
~^^1^^ Cahiers de I'lnstitut d'Histoire de la presse et de I'opinion. No. 3, 1978, pp. 210, 218.
~^^2^^ Harry Pollitt, Selected Articles and Speeches. Vol. II, Lawrence & Wishart Ltd., London, 1954, pp. 132--133.
62 Significantly, the British delegation had no written authority to hold talks in Moscow^^1^^.Bourgeois historians claim that the British and French delegations went to Moscow in order to sign a military convention, but this was not the case. According to British documents, Admiral Drax had been instructed to play for time as long as possible with the objective of wrecking the talks. Drax knew what was required of him. However, even he had serious doubts about the ways this assignment should be accomplished. The question was raised at the Committee of Imperial Defence on August 2, 1939, three days before the British and French delegations departed for the USSR. Taking part in that meeting were Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax, Minister for Coordination of Defence Lord Chatfield, Secretary for War Hore-Belisha, Admiral Drax, and others. We shall give a slightly abridged transcript of this meeting.
``Staff Conversations with Russia.
``Lord Chatfield asked the Delegation whether they had any points to raise on the instructions they had received. "Admiral Drax said that he had a few points on which he would appreciate further enlightenment.
``Firstly, it was assumed that the Mission was to reach a quick decision rather than that the Staff conversations should be allowed to drag on and that the ultimate aim was to achieve a political agreement. On the other hand, in his instructions^^2^^ he had been directed to go slowly and cautiously until such time as the political agreement was reached. There might be some difficulty in this, as it was probable that the Russians would be hoping for some tangible results from the military conversations before they were prepared to give their final agreement to the political pact.
``Lord Halifax agreed. He appreciated that the Mission had a very difficult task. It was, in his opinion, very difficult to dissociate entirely the political from military _-_-_
^^1^^ For details see: M. Andreyeva, K. Dmitriyeva, "Military Talks of the USSR, Britain and France in 1939", Mezhdunarodnaya Zhisn, 1959, No. 2.
^^2^^ For more details see: P.A. Zhilin, How Nazi Germany Prepared an Attack on the Soviet Union (Calculations and Miscalculations), Moscow, 1966 (in Russian).
63 negotiations..,. From a hurried perusal of the Instructions it appeared that the attitude adopted by the Mission, if con fined entirely to the letter of the Instructions, would create a good deal of suspicion in the Russian mind.``Admiral Drax then drew attention to the long list of questions in Part 3 of the Instructions which it was suggested might be put to the Russian General Staff. It would be impossible to put these questions without being prepared to give information in reply to similar questions which might be put by the Russian Staff. For instance, he was instructed to impress upon the Russians the desirability of their supplying war material to Poland, Roumania and Turkey. The Russians might well point out that they were already supplying war material to China, and to ask them to extend supplies to three other countries was asking a good deal....^^1^^ "General Heywood^^2^^ said that in his view the Russian General Staff might tackle the Mission on the question of indirect aggression.^^3^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ To get answers to "similar questions" presented a difficulty to Drax, as, lor that matter, their very content, such as, for instance, the questions meant to ferret out the combat potential of the Soviet armed forces: "Will the Soviet bombers be able to operate against Germany directly from the USSR's territory, or will they have to be based in Poland and Romania?''
``To what naval policy does the Soviet Union suppose to adhere on the Baltic and White Seas? How will it be able to operate against the German merchant marine or the transportation of German troops by sea in those zones?''
``What are the specifications of aviation petrol in the USSR?" The German Ambassador to London, Dirksen, who was informed about the mood among the British government circles, reported to Berlin that "the object of the military mission is more to ascertain the fighting value of the Soviet Army than to make operational arrangements". (Documents and Materials Relating to the Eve of the Second World War. Vol. II. Dirksen Papers (1938--1939). Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1948, p. 103.)
~^^2^^ A member of the British military mission at the Moscow talks.
^^3^^ The question of guarantees against indirect aggression (i. e., seizure of foreign territory under any pretext, as was the case in Czechoslovakia) was posed by the French side (Edouard Daladier) and reflected France's desire to ensure the security of its eastern frontiers. The Soviet government took an understanding view of the French Premier's opinion and regarded __NOTE__ Footnote cont. on page 65. 64
``Admiral Drax asked whether the British Ambassador to Moscow could be invited to ensure, before the arrival of the Mission, that their contact would be direct with the heads of the Russian services. It would, in his opinion, be most unfortunate if the Delegation had to deal with subordinate officers who would constantly be compelled to refer to their superiors.
``Lord Halifax undertook to ask the Ambassador to do his best to arrange these matters on the lines Admiral Drax had suggested.
``Lord Chatfield asked whether it could be assumed that the Chiefs of Staff endorsed the details set out in the Memorandum of instructions.
``The Chiefs of Staff recorded the acceptance of the details of the Memorandum".^^1^^
The clarification received by Admiral Drax confirms the earlier apprehension that the British side was not even intending to achieve an agreement with the USSR. There was no question raised about signing a military convention. Drax was _-_-_ __NOTE__ Footnote cont. from page 64. guarantees against indirect aggression as an important requisite of a tripartite agreement that would give this whole document the necessary reliability. Such guarantees were also of great significance to the Soviet Union. It was necessary, by mutual agreement between Britain, France and the USSR, to rule out any possibility of the territory of the Baltic countries, ostensibly with the voluntary consent of their governments, being used by Germany as a vantage ground for an attack on the Soviet Union. The USSR had offered a clear-cut definition of indirect aggression and included it in its proposals made on July 9, 1939. "The term 'indirect aggression' applies to an action in which any of the above states may acquiesce under the threat of force by another power, or without such a threat, and which entails the use of the territory and the forces of the given state for aggression against it or against any of the contracting parties and, consequently, entails the loss by that state of its independence or violation of its neutrality". (The USSR in the Struggle for Peace on the Eve of the Second World War, pp. 486--487, in Russian.) The progress of the talks showed, however, that Britain and France were trying to drag in a formulation of indirect aggression that would not only fail to guarantee the joint actions of the three powers, but would actually lay the USSR open to such aggression. The position of Britain and France on the question of indirect aggression revealed their reluctance to conclude a tripartite agreement with the USSR and was one of the reasons for the failure of the Moscow talks.
^^1^^ PRO. F.O. 371/23072, pp. 98--100.
__PRINTERS_P_65_COMMENT__ 3-682 65 advised to discuss military plans on a "purely hypothetical basis". British diplomacy concentrated its efforts primarily on ways to camouflage the true aims that the British and French missions sought to achieve at the Moscow talks, also to "find itself an out" in answering questions of substance from the Soviet side, which Drax feared most of all. Halifax outlined, in no uncertain terms, what in his opinion should be done to wreck the talks: to reject "firmly" any proposal for Britain and France to help coordinate the necessary measures with their allies-Poland and Romania-to forestall German aggression. Drax carried out this order of his superior, albeit in a somewhat different situation.Reactionary historians claim that an atmosphere of suspicion surrounded the Western missions in Moscow and that they felt they were under constant surveillance. This assertion is at variance with what the British ambassador to Moscow, William Seeds, wrote in a letter to Lord Halifax on August 17. Seeds noted the hospitality and courtesy shown by the Soviet side to the Western missions. He also said that "Marshal Voroshilov whom I had not had the opportunity of meeting before ... gave a most favourable impression both of friendliness and energy. He seemed really pleased to meet the* Mission." "The first business meeting of the three Missions took place on Saturday morning August 12 at the Ministry of Defence despite the fact that this was a `free day'"^^1^^.
On that day it was found out that the British mission had no official credentials for holding talks. A transcript of the ensuing dialogue between the heads of the Soviet and British missions captures that awkward moment.
``Marshal Voroshilov: '...But in my opinion we need written credentials in order that we may all know within what limits you are empowered to negotiate, what questions you can deal with, to what extent you are competent to discuss them, and to what result these negotiations may lead. Our powers, as you see, are all-embracing.... Your powers, outlined verbally, are not entirely clear to me. In any case, it seems to me that the question is not an idle one; it determines from the outset the order and form of our negotiations.'
_-_-_~^^1^^ PRO. F.O. 371/23072, pp. 35--39.
66``Admiral Drax points out ... that if it were convenient to transfer the negotiations to London he would be given full powers....
``Marshal Voroshilov remarks amid general laughter that bringing papers from London to Moscow is easier than for so big a company to go to London."^^1^^
In the evening of August 12, Drax sent Chatfield a telegram saying: "At the first meeting today the Russian delegates produced a document appointing by name five Soviet officers to act as plenipotentiaries with power to sign (a convention-^uthor). Voroshilov hoped that we had similar powers. The French General^^2^^ stated that he had authority to discuss but not to sign and produced a document signed by E. Daladier giving him power'to negotiate with the High Commander of the Soviet Armed Forces on all questions regarding collaboration needed between the armed forces of the two countries'". Admiral Drax pointed out that the British had no written credentials. He declared that this could be at once rectified and that they would obtain authority similar to the French. He requested that the credentials be sent by air mail, and pointed out that it was essential that the three members of the British delegation be mentioned by name.
Voroshilov suggested that the conversations should continue pending the arrival of the written authority. Admiral Drax emphasised that "It was urged by the Russians and agreed by all that absolute secrecy^^3^^ in regard to the press _-_-_
^^1^^ ``Negotiations Between the Military Mission of the USSR, Britain and France in August 1939". International Affairs, Moscow, 1959, No. 2, p. 111.
~^^2^^ The head of the French mission General Doumenc.
^^3^^ Secrecy was an obvious condition for military talks. On its part, however, the British side violated it on many occasions, which further complicated the negotiations. Ambassador Seeds wrote to the Foreign Office on August 3 (the letter was received on August 24): "My position as negotiator has again and again been made unnecessarily arduous by a stream of indiscretions and leakages... I am not complaining of incidents or factors outside the control of His Majesty's Government.... But I am placed in an impossible position vis-a-vis Molotov when, for example, a London newspaper publishes our proposal for a secret annex to the treaty almost at the same moment as we suggest it to the Soviet Government." (F.O. 371/23070, pp. 167--168.)
__PRINTERS_P_67_COMMENT__ 3* 67 should be maintained, until an agreed statement could be issued. I request that this be observed with reference to this telegram. Significantly, the French Ambassador and the General were making no report to Paris"^^1^^.The officials in London were in no hurry to forward the papers. It was only on August 15 that the documents were at last prepared for dispatch. The document signed by Lord Halifax read that Admiral Drax, Major-General Heywood and Marshal of the Air Force Barnett were "constituted and appointed plenipotentiaries and representatives having full power and authority to negotiate with the High Command of the Armed Forces of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on all questions regarding collaboration between the Armed Forces of the Union and those of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".^^2^^ As can be seen, the British mission had not been given powers to sign a military convention or any other related documents.
When, upon Admiral Drax's arrival in Moscow, the British Embassy read the instructions he had been given in London, the British diplomats could not help noticing the inconsistencies and ambiguities of the objectives which the British government wanted to achieve through military talks. Ambassador Seeds sent the following telegram to London on August 12:
``Admiral Drax's written instructions seem to the effect that military conversations go slowly, until agreement has been reached on political questions still outstanding. I have pointed out to him that, in my opinion, which is shared by the French Ambassador, Monsieur Molotov on his side will probably evade coming to any agreement with us on these political points until he has reason to believe that military talks have at least made very considerable progress.
``Under such conditions I consider the military talks are likely to produce no results beyond arousing once again Russian fears that we are not in earnest, and are not trying to conclude a concrete and definite agreement.... I should deeply regret if that were the actual decision of his Majesty's _-_-_
~^^1^^ PRO, P.O. 371/23070, p. 179.
~^^2^^ PRO, F.O. 371/23070, p. 183.
68 Government as all indications so far go to show that Soviet military negotiators are really out for business."^^1^^The British government was clearly bent on stalling the talks. At a time when the Soviet delegation offered a well substantiated and clearly formulated plan for coordinating the military efforts of the three powers to check German aggression, the Western delegations did not go beyond generalities.^^2^^ The desire of the Western powers to achieve an agreement that would open the USSR to an attack by the Nazi armies became particularly clear during the discussion of the cardinal question of letting Soviet troops through the territory of Poland and Romania in the event of German aggression to ensure an effective defence not only of the Soviet frontiers, but also of the whole of Poland and Romania. On August 14 Voroshilov asked Drax and Doumenc to clarify their positions on this very important question.
On the night of August 14 (or to be more precise at 1.00 a.m. August 15), Ambassador Seeds sent an express telegram:
``French Ambassador and I have discussed with Heads of Mission the situation arising out of this morning's meeting with Soviet delegation.
``He and I are agreed that Russians have now raised fundamental problem on which military talks will succeed or fail.... We are agreed that position taken up by Soviet delegation is one on which they will stand firnvand that any attempts to shake it will meet with the same failure as has been the case in so much of our political negotiations.
``Our suggestion is that French General Staff should get in touch with Polish General Staff and obtain their consent to the three delegations.... I beg to stress the need for extreme urgency arid extreme secrecy."^^3^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Ibid., p. 168.
~^^2^^ For details see: A History of the Second World War 1939--1945, Vol. 2, pp. 144--147.
~^^3^^ PRO, F.O. 371/23072, pp. 190--191.
69Meanwhile Drax was marking time at the talks, setting forth home truths such as "it is necessary to cut off all enemy communications", "find and smash the enemy fleet", etc.
Some Western authors have given currency to the version that the talks were stalled mainly by the military weakness of the Soviet Union, which was a matter of speculation and guesswork in London and Paris. This version was on several occasions used by Chamberlain and his men at British Cabinet meetings at the time when the Moscow talks were in progress. What grounds did the British government have to think that the Soviet Union was weak militarily? Undoubtedly, the British and French governments were very well informed of the armed forces that the Soviet Union was prepared to field against an aggressor in Europe: 136 divisions, 5 thousand heavy artillery pieces, 9 to 10 thousand tanks, from 5 to 6.5 thousand combat aircraft. The proposals put forward by the Soviet delegation at the talks contained not only these data, but also a converted plan of action by the three powers in the event of German aggression in Europe^^1^^. Extensive information with regard to the Soviet military strength is also contained in a report of the subcommittee of the Chiefs of Staff Committee, a body which, by British standards, is very competent in such matters. The report presented to the Cabinet read:
``At our Meeting on 16th August, 1939, we gave consideration to the military aspects of the action proposed in connection with the Mission telegram.... In our opinion, it is only logical that the Russians should be given every facility for rendering assistance and putting their maximum weight into the scale on the side of the anti-aggression Powers. We consider it so important to meet the Russians in this matter that, if necessary, the strongest pressure should be exerted on Poland and Roumania to persuade them to adopt a helpful attitude....
``The conclusion of a Treaty with Russia appears to us to be the best way of preventing a war. The satisfactory _-_-_
~^^1^^ The USSR in the Struggle for Peace on the Eve of the Second World War, Moscow, 1971, pp. 574--577 (in Russian).
70 conclusion of this Treaty will undoubtedly be endangered if the present Russian proposals for co-operation with Poland and Pvoumania are turned down by those countries"^^1^^.The American historian Telford Taylor blamed the deadlock in the talks on the British and French who, he said, were "too slow and too late"^^2^^. Duroselle believes that France "seemed to be the only one of the three powers that was anxious to reach agreement^^3^^". A more impartial and objective participant in the Moscow talks, Andre Beaufre, later an army general of note, wrote about the Soviet proposals that "it was hard to be any more clear or concrete....These proposals stood in startling contrast with the nebulous abstractions of the Franco-British plattorm... The Soviet arguments carried a Lot of weight.... Our position was false from beginning to end".^^4^^
A short while ago a book was published in Paris whose author, L6on Noel, was the French ambassador in Warsaw at the time of the Moscow talks. In spite of his antiSoviet outpourings, Noel, nevertheless, sheds some more light on what really happened during those critical days.
The instructions issued by General Maurice Gamelin, Chief of the French General Staff of National Defence, to the French mission at the Moscow talks, were "too vague".^^5^^ The French political and military leaders were very well familiar with the position of Poland and, what is more, using bourgeois Poland's hostile policy for the USSR as a screen, the French government, just like the British government, played a treacherous game aimed at scuttling the Moscow talks. Noel cites a typical episode. On August 19, in a talk with the French military attache, the chief of the Polish General Staff, Waclaw Stachiewicz, reaffirmed the refusal of the Polish government to allow Soviet troops to pass through Polish territory in the event of German aggression. To which the French military attache told Stachiewicz: "Don't _-_-_
~^^1^^ PRO, P.O. 371/23071, pp. 228--231.
~^^2^^ Telford Taylor, Munich..., p. 971).
~^^3^^ Jean-Baptiste Duroselle, La Decadence 1932-J939. pp. 320 323.
~^^4^^ General Beaufre, Le drame de 1940. Plon, Paris, 1965, pp. 148--149, 156. L6on Noel, La guerre de 39 a commence guatre ans plus tot.
^^5^^ Editions France Empire, Paris, 1979, p. 154.
71 tell me about your refusal just yet. It would be better if our mission in Moscow could manoeuvre as though you had not yet stated your refusal"^^1^^. Noel also quotes General Beaufre's assessment of the strategy of the Western powers at the Moscow talks: "The idea was not to have the Poles reply whether or not they were prepared to give Soviet troops free passage across their territory, but to find a pretext to drag out the talks...".^^2^^But for what purpose? To this Soviet historians give an exhaustive reply: Britain was holding secret negotiations with the fascist Reich behind the back of the Soviet Union. In the course of these talks the British government made far-reaching proposals about Anglo-German cooperation 'and about concluding a non-aggression treaty. The British side also proposed that the two countries divide the world into spheres of influence and refrain from interfering in these spheres. Moreover, the British ruling quarters promised the Nazis to break off the talks with the USSR and to renounce their guarantees to Poland which they had shortly before given to her, i.e., to betray Poland to Hitler the same way as Czechoslovakia had been betrayed. The details of this collusion, according to British sources, were to be specified at a personal meeting between Chamberlain and Goring who was expected to arrive on the British Isles on August 23. Goring's plane was to land on a secluded aerodrome in Hertfordshire where he was to be met in deep secrecy by representatives of the British government. From here the Reichsmarschall was to proceed to Chamberlain's country residence at Chequers^^3^^.
A considerable share of the responsibility for this situation rests with the ruling elite in the United States. It is still hard to ascertain the degree of responsibility, although the facts at the disposal of the historians show that while trying to create the impression that the United _-_-_
~^^1^^ L\'eon Noel, Op. fit., pp. 129--130.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 156.
~^^3^^Leonard Mosley, On Borrowed Time. How World War II Began. Random House, New York, 1969, p. 366.
72 States stood aloof from European politics, American diplomats were also trying hard to prevent the conclusion of an agreement between the USSR, Britain and France, and were in favour of collusion with Germany against the Soviet Union. "In economic matters Germany has to have a free hand in the East as well as in the Southeast", said one of the participants in the "negotiations game", the American ambassador to London, Joseph P. Kennedy.^^1^^ Characteristically, some of the American historians, Telford Taylor among them, each putting his own interpretation on these events, seem to be avoiding extra trouble by keeping silent about the fact that Britain and Germany had been negotiating behind the back of the USSR.The finale of the Moscow talks is well known. On August 22, 1939, Doumenc told the head of the Soviet delegation that he had received an affirmative answer from his government to the "key question" and credentials to sign the military convention. At the same time he admitted that he knew nothing about the positions of the British, Polish and Romanian governments.^^2^^ Thus the Western powers gave no answer to this key problem at issue, bringing the talks into stalemate.
The Soviet Union never let up on its efforts to create a collective security system in order to halt German aggression and to prevent a second world war. The breaking off of the Moscow talks by Britain and France meant that the last chance of halting an impending Wehrmacht onslaught and of forestalling the war had been lost. The Soviet Union found itself in an extremely difficult situation. The plans of world imperialism to attack the Soviet Union from west and east were close to fruition (it should be borne in mind that at that time the Soviet armed forces, together with Mongolian troops, were fighting off a Japanese attack on the River Khalkhin Gol in Mongolia).
_-_-_^^1^^ Documents on German Foreign Policy 1918--1945. Series D. Vol. 1, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, 1949, p. 718.
^^2^^ The USSR in the Struggle for Peace on the Eve of the Second World War, pp. 631--632.
73In a situation which had taken such a menacing turn for the USSR the Soviet government decided to accept Germany's proposal to sign a non-aggression treaty. There is nothing secret about the reasons why Western historians still continue to fiercely attack the Soviet-German treaty of 1939 (Andreas Hillgruber in the FRG, Gerhard L. Weinberg in the United States, and others^^1^^). This forced measure enabled the USSR to ward off, at least for a time, the threat of an attack from the West and, as the subsequent events showed, to gain almost two years of respite for strengthening its defences, and to split up the antiSoviet front of the imperialist powers.
The Soviet Union right from the start officially declared its neutrality to the warring imperialist groups. The interests of the Soviet people and of the world revolutionary movement required the Soviet Union to complete the building of a socialist society and to build up its defences. An important role in the accomplishment of this historic task was assigned to foreign policy. In the first place it was necessary to strengthen the security of the Soviet frontiers, to confine fascist aggression to a limited geographical zone, to make Germany observe as long as possible its non-aggression commitments and to neutralise the threat of an attack on the Soviet Union by Japan. This course of action served the interests of not only the USSR, and the cause of world socialism, but also of all nations that had fallen victim to fascist aggression or were threatened with attack.
The USSR attached special significance to the strengthening of its Western borders. Acting jointly and separately, the imperialist powers and their allies, in 1918--1920, wrested from the young Soviet republic a number of areas in an effort to strangle people's power. Late in 1917 and early in 1918, the troops of boyard Romania _-_-_
~^^1^^ Andreas Hillgruber, Zur Entstehung des Zweiten Weltkrieges. Fonchungestand und Literatur. Droste Verlag, Diisseldorf, 1980, S. 57; Gerhard L. Weinberg, The Foreign Policy of Hitler's Germany. Starting World War II 1937--1939. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1980, pp. 673--674.
74 invaded the Soviet republic and seized Bessarabia. Under the terms of the Versailles Treaty (1919) Romania received also Bukovina, in defiance of the decision of the popular veche (parliament) on November'3, 1918, on joining the Soviet Ukraine. In 1919, the foreign invaders (Germany, Britain and Poland) and the internal counter-revolution overthrew Soviet power in the Soviet republics of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia and replaced it with ultra-reactionary bourgeois dictatorships. Western Byelorussia and the Western Ukraine were incorporated into Poland under the Treaty of Riga (1921) which ended the war let loose in 1920 by the reactionary regime in Poland supported by Britain and France. In 1939--1940, this historical injustice was corrected, and the people of Western Byelorussia, the Western Ukraine, Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina rejoined the peoples of the USSR. Of tremendous importance was the victory of the revolutionary forces and the restoration of Soviet power in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, whose people found their salvation from capitalist oppression and fascist menace in, voluntary accession to the USSR. In early August 1940, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, at its seventh session, acceded to the request of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia to be admitted to the USSR as full and equal sovereign Soviet republics. As a result, the Baltic region ceased to be a vantage ground for imperialist aggression against the USSR.The signing of a peace treaty which ended the Finnish-Soviet armed conflict in 1940 strengthened the security of Leningrad and the northwestern borders of the USSR.^^1^^ The neutrality pact signed with Japan in April 1941 ensured the security of the Soviet borders in the Far East.
The Soviet Union strictly observed its internationalist commitments by confining fascist aggression. The struggle _-_-_
^^1^^ In November 1939, the reactionary government of Finland, prodded by the imperialist powers, initiated an armed conflict on the SovietFinnish border. The military operations that followed ended in defeat for Finland and forced it to sign a peace treaty with the USSR on March 12, 1940.
75 of the Communist Party and government of the USSR for strengthening its international positions and security resulted in accomplishing key foreign policy goals in 1939--1941, and over the longer term played an important role in routing the invaders.Soviet analysts note that this period of Soviet foreign policy (1939--1941) has come in for more ferocious criticism and pseudo-scientific slander on the part of the West than any other period in Soviet history.^^1^^
Reactionary historians and ideologists are still busy pushing the myth of collusion between the Soviet Union and Hitler Germany. For example, the authors of the official West German history book, Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg, write not about the German attack on Poland but about an alleged Germano-Soviet attack on Poland in September 1939.^^2^^ Forrest C. Pogue in the United States tries to prove that the non-aggression treaty with Germany "arrayed the Soviet Union on the side of Hitler".^^3^^ In 1979, these malicious fabrications were picked up by the ideological mentors of the Polish counter-revolution, the agents of the imperialist intelligence services, which entrenched themselves in the KOS-KOR and among the leaders of the much touted Solidarity. They interpret the liberation of Western Byelorussia and the Western Ukraine as Soviet annexation and equate Germany's treacherous attack on Poland, which deprived it of its national independence, with the march of liberation of the Soviet army through territory which had been taken from Soviet Russia and which was under imminent threat of Nazi occupation^^4^^.
Also current to this day are fabrications about the economic assistance rendered by the USSR to Germany _-_-_
^^1^^ For details see: P. P. Sevostyanov, Facing Great Trials. Foreign Policy of the USSR on the Em of the Great Patriotic War, September 1939-June 1941. Moscow, 1981, p. 8 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band. 2, S. 126--127.
~^^3^^ Forrest C. Pogue, Politics and Formulation of American Strategy in World War II. San Francisco, 1975, p. 2.
~^^4^^ See: P. Zhilin, "The Lessons of the Past and the Concerns of the Present" in: Kommunist, No. 7, 1981, p. 69 (in Russian).
76 when the latter was at war with Britain and France in 1939--1940. Most of this assistance allegedly came in the form of oil deliveries. To this we have to say that economic relations between the USSR and Germany were primarily based on the trade-and-credit agreement signed on August 19, 1939, and on an economic agreement of February 11, 1940, which provided for the export of raw materials from the USSR to Germany and the import of manufactured goods from Germany to the Soviet Union. The list of goods that Germany exported to the Soviet Union included weapons, which accorded with the Soviet interests of defence. For example, the Soviet Union succeeded in buying some German combat aircraft, including the Messerschmitt-109, Junkers-88, and Dornier-215, which helped our military experts to ascertain where Germany stood in aviation technology. The well known Soviet aircraft designer Alexander Yakovlev recalls that after examining the German aircraft manufacturing industry, in accordance with instructions of the Soviet government, he wrote a report to Joseph Stalin back in November 1940. Stalin's comment: "Have our people study German aircraft. Compare them to our latest models. Learn to fight them"^^1^^.A collection of articles published in the Federal Republic of Germany in 1977 under the editorship of Friedrich Forstmeier (former chief of the military history department of the Bundeswehr) and Hans-Erich Volkmann (one of the principal authors of Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg) says: "In its commercial relations with Germany the Soviet Union was a hard bargainer which very consistently stood up for its own economic and defence interests. The often repeated view that the Soviet deliveries of raw materials were 'a great boost' to the German war-oriented economy does not take into consideration the volume and variety of the deliveries which the Soviet Union demanded and, indeed, received from Germany. For example, late in 1940, the USSR agreed to increase its grain _-_-_
^^1^^ A. Yakovlev. The Aim of a Lifetime. Notes of an Aircraft Designer. Moscow, 1974, p. 220 (in Russian).
77 deliveries to Germany by 10 per cent, in exchange for Germany increasing her deliveries of aluminium and cobalt which she was badly in need of herself. Any German requests for additional deliveries of raw materials were countered by new Soviet demands not only for machine tools or lorries, but also for military equipment^^1^^''. As for the oil deliveries from the Soviet Union to Germany, these were a modest 9,000 tons in the total of 523,000 tons that Germany imported over the first three war months (less than 2 per cent), according to a secret report drawn up by the policy planning subcommittee of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Britain. In other words, the myth of Soviet-German collusion is refuted by documents which are available in the West. However anti-Soviet propaganda ignores such documents and their assessments, trying at the same time to sow enmity and hatred for the USSR.The West German historian Heinrich Hartle furnishes his own brand of evidence to prove that the USSR was "aggressive". He contends that in the course of the German-Soviet talks in November 1940, the Soviet Union had demanded recognition of Bulgaria, Romania, Finland and Turkey as belonging to the Soviet sphere of influence^^2^^. The New York Times wrote on December 30, 1979, that at the Soviet-German talks in Berlin in November 1940, the government of the USSR had insisted on having its sphere of influence extended to the Black Sea straits and as far away as the Indian Ocean. This interpretation of the German-Soviet talks was clearly put forward with the uninformed reader in mind, for in actual fact the Soviet position at the talks was exactly the opposite.
German diplomats had prepared a draft agreement between the Axis and the Soviet Union, which had been asked to accede to the territorial claims of its signatories. The Soviet delegation firmly rejected the proposal of the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Quoted from: Kriegswirtschaft undRiistung 1939--1945. Herausgegeben von Friedrich Forstmeier und Hans-Erich Volkmann, Droste Verlag, D\"usseldorf, 1977, S. 382.
~^^2^^ Heinrich Hartle, Die Kriegsschuld der Sieger..., S. 323.
78 Nazi leaders. The Soviet refusal to discuss the Nazi programme of "delineation of the spheres of influence" and the opposition of the Soviet government to the territorial expansion of the Nazis demonstrated that the USSR would not fall for any diversionary tactics and entertained no illusions with regard to Germany's true intentions. In his "political testament" Hitler wrote that it was after the departure of the Soviet delegation that he decided to settle "old scores" with Russia. At that time Germany's preparations for an attack on the USSR were already going ahead full tilt.^^1^^ This is what happened in actual fact.The main achievement of the foreign policy of the USSR in the initial period of the Second World War was that the Soviet Union had succeeded in staying out of the armed conflict, in gaining nearly two years of respite which had such far-ranging world-wide consequences. By the time Hitler attacked the USSR the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Soviet Government had succeeded not only in breaking out of the foreign policy isolation created by the U.S.-supported Munich conspiracy of Britain and France with the fascist states, but also in destroying this anti-Soviet front and in creating conditions for building an anti-fascist coalition of the strongest nations of the world: the USSR, the USA and Britain.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ THE POLICY OF APPEASEMENTBy the beginning of the Second World War, China, Ethiopia, Spain, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Albania had fallen victim to the aggressor. Many other countries of Europe, Asia and Africa found themselves dependent on the fascist-militarist bloc. But those were only the first consequences of the criminal policy of appeasement of the aggressors pursued by the ruling quarters in Britain, France and the United States.
_-_-_^^1^^ See: A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. 1974, Vol. 3, PP- 346--347.
79At crack of dawn, September 1, 1939, Hitler Germany invaded Poland. The German air force delivered massive attacks on Polish airfields, railway junctions, major administrative and industrial centres. The powerful Wehrmacht land forces pierced the Polish defences with concentrated armour attacks at several points and surged forth deep into the country in the direction of Warsaw from the north, west, and south-from eastern Prussia, eastern Germany and Slovakia.
On September 8, the Nazis reached the approaches to Warsaw and, two days later, encircled it.
The garrison and residents of Warsaw braved the savage air strikes and artillery fire for 20 days. But the forces were not equal. Early in October all combat operations on the territory of Poland ceased. Hitler Germany thus received additional raw material and industrial resources, and a good vantage ground for further aggression in the East.
The day Germany attacked Poland went down in history as the first day of the Second World War.
On September 3, 1939, the British and French governments declared war on Germany. They had to do that because they had earlier given Poland guarantees of independence and security and were . also bound by their own allied treaties. The entry of Britain and France into the war did not at all mean that those in power were concerned about the future of the Polish people.
The passivity of the British and French ruling quarters, despite the commitments they had assumed to help Poland in the event of German aggression, was so obvious that none of the Western historians could pretend otherwise. This, however, has not prevented them from producing an array of "arguments" in support of this position of the Anglo-French coalition. Many of them favour the version that in September 1939, Britain and France were "unable" to give an armed rebuff to Nazi Germany and to help allied Poland. The American historians Bragdon and McCutchen write; "Two days after Hitler's armies 80 invaded Poland, Great Britain and France, abandoning appeasement at last, declared war on Germany. The British and French were unable, however, to aid the Poles. They had neither sufficient land forces to invade Germany, nor enough bombers to attack from the air."^^1^^
This line of reasoning is false because it is meant to cover up for the betrayal of Poland by its Western allies. In early September 1939, Britain and France, with their combined land and air strength, to say nothing about their naval superiority, had an edge over Germany. The West German historian Michael Freund quotes Alfred Jodl, the Chief of the Operations Staff of the Wehrmacht, who said at the Nuremberg Trial in 1946: "We did not suffer defeat in 1939 only because almost 110 French and British divisions in the West, at the time of the Polish campaign, were utterly passive in the face of the advancing twenty-five German divisions"^^2^^.
The British historian, Nicholas Fleming writes in his book August 1939 (about the initial stages of the Second World War) that on September 3, 1939, the British air force proceeded with its operation codenamed Nickels whose objective was to drop propaganda leaflets over Germany, rather than attack it. The U.S. government also failed to come out in support of Poland. and limited itself to calling upon Hitler "to show humanity"^^3^^. At the same time Fleming sets out to justify the inaction on the part of Britain and France, claiming that they were "dominated by defensive thinking" and were guided by "humanitarian motives", trying to spare the otherwise "inevitable casualties among German civilians"^^4^^.
The real reason for the inaction of the ruling quarters in Britain and France should be sought elsewhere, namely in the political directives worked out even before the _-_-_
^^1^^ Henry W. Bragdon and Samuel P. McCutchen, History of a Free People. The Macmillan Company, New York, 1956, p. 607.
~^^2^^ Michael Freund, Deutsche Geschichte. Giitersloch, 1973, S. 1318--1319.
~^^3^^ Nicholas Fleming, August 1939- The Last Days of Peace. Peter Davies, London, 1979, pp. 208, 211.
^^4^^ Ibid., p. 212. Also see: The Simon and Schuster Encyclopedia of World War II. Ed. by Thomas Parrish, New York, 1978, p. 229.
__PRINTERS_P_81_COMMENT__ 4-682 81 outbreak of the German-Polish war. Poland was deliberately sacrificed to the Nazis as part of a plan hatched long since to help bring the Nazi army directly to the frontiers of the USSR and in this way have it deployed for an attack on our country. Evidence of this is their persistent attempts to settle their own outstanding problems with Germany at the expense of other countries and their efforts to disrupt the Moscow talks in the summer of 1939. These and other actions of the Western "democracies", and the anti-Soviet policy of the Polish ruling quarters convinced the Nazis that they could seize Poland without impeachment. On August 31, 1939, the Chief of the General Staff of the Wehrmacht's land forces made this entry in his diary: "The Fiihrer is calm.... He hopes that the French and British will not enter German territory."^^1^^ This forecast was based on the much advertised readiness of the appeasers to come to an agreement with the Nazis on joint action against the USSR. Neither Britain, nor France, nor the United States took the necessary steps to prevent Nazi Germany from advancing east, to the Soviet frontiers.Walther Hubatsch (FRG) and other reactionary historians and political analysts also veer far from the truth when they claim that the Nazis, after their invasion of Poland, were prepared to sign a peace treaty with Britain and France^^2^^. But the latter apparently were not concerned about peace: they wanted to see the aggression in Europe continued. In October 1939, right after the fall of Poland, the Nazis began to redeploy the HQs of Army Groups North and South and six field armies, and some large combat units. By the beginning of November the number of German divisions on the Western front had grown to ninety-six.^^3^^ On October 19, the General Staff of the German land forces issued a directive on preparations _-_-_
~^^1^^ Generaloberst Franz Haider, Kriegstagebuch. Band I, W. Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart, 1962, S. 48.
~^^2^^ Quoted from: Der 2. Weltkrieg. Bilder. Daten, Dokumente. Bertelsmann Lexicon-Verlag, Giitersloh, 1976, S. 89, 97.
^^3^^ See: A History of the Second World War 1939--1945, Vol. 2, p. 48.
82 for an advance on Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg and France in order to rout them in a Blitzkrieg^^1^^.The hypocritical statements of the Hitler government about its peaceful intentions in the autumn of 1939 only served as a screen for the deployment of the German forces in the West and were clearly meant to lull the vigilance of other nations the Nazis were planning to attack. Moreover, Nazi Germany demanded that Britain and France recognise all German conquests in Europe and that the colonial possessions be redivided in Germany's favour. Should they have accepted these demands, the Western imperialist states would have lost their positions as great powers and would have had to abandon most of the raw material resources they had captured earlier, and also the traditional markets for their goods and the spheres of investment. They could not have possibly made such sweeping concessions. But even then Britain and France still entertained hopes of striking a bargain with Germany, at the same time using other countries to weaken its power by re-directing the Hitler war machine from the West to the Scandinavian and Balkan countries, and onto the Soviet Union. In his memoirs the Commander-in-Chief of the French armed forces wrote that one of the aims of the Anglo-French coalition was to bring about a clash between German and Soviet interests.^^2^^
The period of obvious inaction of the British and French armies between the declaration of war by Britain and France on Germany and the Nazi offensive in the west in May 1940, came to be known in Western history books as the "phony war", or the "sitting war".
Many Western historians admit that during the phony war the Anglo-French ruling quarters, on the one hand, _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibidem.
~^^2^^ General Gamelin, Servir. La guerre (septembre J939--19 mai 1940). Vol. Ill, Librairie Plon, Paris, 1947, p. 110.
__PRINTERS_P_83_COMMENT__ 4* 83 did not wage any active struggle against Germany and, on the other, busied themselves with plans for making war on the Soviet Union. According to the British historian AJ.P. Taylor, the British government took no action against Germany because it had underrated the state of the German economy. He insists that in the opinion of Britain's military and political leaders "the Nazi economic system was at its last gasp" following Poland's downfall, and that "Germany would collapse without further fighting''.^^1^^ As for the plans of Britain and France to start aggression against the USSR, they were brought forth by a desire to cut off "German supplies of oil from the Caucasus" and "to aid Finland".^^2^^ Similar views have been aired by many other Western historians. In actual fact, the main reason for the phony war in Europe and for the plans of joint Anglo-French intervention against the Soviet Union was the unremitting anti-Sovietism of the ruling elite of Britain and France, ruinous to the national interests of both countries, and their continuing hopes that they would after all be able to settle their differences with Nazi Germany at the expense of the USSR. With this aim in view, the governments of Britain and France had, according to some incomplete data, at least 160 contacts with the Nazis at different representation levels between September 1939 and April 1940.^^3^^ In pressing for compromise with Germany the leaders of the Anglo-French coalition brought forth a host of plans for a joint Anglo-French-German military campaign against the USSR. That was the last and riskiest gamble in the strategy of the "Munichmen". Today some bourgeois historians are trying to present the plans for this campaign as some sort of pipe dream.^^4^^ But the documents of that _-_-_~^^1^^ A.J.P.Taylor, The Second World War. An Illustrated History. Hamish Hamilton, London, 1975, pp. 42--43.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 45.
~^^3^^ Deutschland im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Band 1, Akademie-Verlag, Berlin, 1974, S. 247.
~^^4^^ Giinter Kahle, Das Kaukasusprojekt der Alliierten vom Jahre 1940. Rheinisch-Westfalische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Westdeutscher Verlag, Opladen, 1973, S. 40--41.
84 time prove to the contrary. British and French troops were intended to deliver two strikes: one in the north in the direction of Leningrad and Murmansk, and the other in the south, in the direction of the oil fields in the Caucasus and at the Soviet navy in the Black Sea. The AngloFrench plans gave Germany the option of taking the "natural step" and delivering a strike at the central areas of the Soviet Union. At the same time the British and French strategists heavily relied on the anti-Soviet sentiments of the Japanese militarists who they hoped would draw Japan into the war, thus driving the USSR into a situation where it would be caught between two fronts.^^1^^The military preparations in Britain and France for war against the USSR dealt a telling blow to the political prestige and, indeed, the military power of these countries, making them incautious of an impending attack by the Wehrmacht. "The mood of a crusade was strongly felt everywhere", wrote French journalist Henri de Kerillis about the atmosphere of that time. "There was only one call heard: 'War on Russia!' Those who but recently demanded immobility and inaction behind the Maginot Line, are now pleading that an army should be sent to fight at the North Pole.... The delirium of anti-communism has reached its epileptic peak ."^^2^^
The leaders of the fascist German Reich were fully informed of the anti-Soviet activities of the British and French governments. A political intelligence service report for the foreign policy department of the Nazi party (May 3, 1940) reads: "With the outbreak of the war, the countries hostile to the Soviet Union have grown increasingly active. They attach particular importance to this question and have formulated a slogan: 'liberation from the Moscow yoke' ... The activity of Paris and _-_-_
^^1^^ For details see: A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 3, pp. 43--48; A. Yakushevsky, "The Aggressive Plans and Actions of the Western Powers Against the USSR in 1939--1941" in Voyennoistorichesky zhurnal, 1981, No. 8, pp. 47--57 (both in Russian).
~^^2^^ Henri de Kerillis, Francois, Void la Verite! Editions de la Maison Fran^aise, New York, 1942, p. 102.
85 London can be illustrated by the fact that they have created a government of the so-called Ukrainian National Republic..., also a Ukrainian legion in France and nationalist Caucasian units in the army of Weygand.^^1^^ This information undoubtedly strengthened the confidence of the Hitlerite leadership that the Western powers were too busy with their anti-Soviet military preparations to be able to give sufficient attention to defence, ma King it that much easier for the Germans to defeat them.On April 9, 1940, the Nazi armies invaded Norway and Denmark. The Anglo-French coalition again demonstrated, as they had done in the case of Poland, their unwillingness to counter the aggression. The influential quarters in London and Paris believed that the seizure of Scandinavia would draw the attention of the Hitlerites away from the Western front, on the one hand, and, on the other, would bring them closer to the Soviet border. In 1940, Winston Churchill said: "We have more to gain than lose by a German attack upon Norway and Sweden''.^^2^^
When the Nazis invaded Denmark and Norway (this operation was- codenamed Weseriibung) the Anglo-French coalition landed a small number of troops at several ports of central and northern Norway between April 14 and 18. This landing, however, did not amount to any mdre than a limited action. In early May the allied troops left central Norway and early in June 1940, northern Norway. This gave the Hitlerites full control of an important strategic vantage ground for carrying the war to the north of Europe, both against the Soviet Union and the Western countries.
The hopes of the Anglo-French coalition that the struggle for Scandinavia would draw the attention of the German military command away from the war with Britain and France were built on sand.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Bundesarchiv (Koblenz). Ns 343/37, Bl. 2. Maxime Weygand was in command of the French forces deployed in Syria and the Lebanon and intended for military action against the USSR.
~^^2^^ Churchill Revised. A Critical Assessment. The Dial Press, New York, 1969, p. 207.
86On May 10, 1940, the Wehrmacht mounted a sweeping offensive in Western Europe. The Scandinavian campaign did not prevent Germany from concentrating a large striking force in the West: 3,300,000 troops, 136 divisions, 2, 580 tanks, 3,824 aircraft. The combined force of France, Britain, Belgium and Holland to counter this offensive on the northeastern front had 3,785,000 troops, 147 divisions, 3,099 tanks and 3,791 aircraft.^^1^^ This means that the total strength of the Allied armies was greater than that of the Nazis. This superiority was not put to good use, which led to the capitulation of Holland on May 14 and of Belgium on May 28. On June 22, the representatives of the French government signed the instruments of surrender in the Compiegne Forest, in the same railway carriage in which, twenty-two years before, French Marshal Foch had dictated the terms of truce to Germany after its defeat in the First World War. The representatives of the French government recognised control by German occupation authorities over two-thirds of French territory and undertook to bear all the expenses of the upkeep of the German occupation troops, and gave their formal consent to the demobilisation and disarmament of the French armed forces.
The less than one-year-old Anglo-French military alliance collapsed in an attempt to counter the Nazi summer offensive of 1940, which largely contributed to all further successes of the fascist bloc whose armed forces occupied in the spring of 1941 Yugoslavia, Greece and Crete, and mounted aggressive operations in northeast Africa.
Western historians have written many books about the military defeat of France, which they call "the battle of France". Their arguments nearly always boil down to the superiority of the German Blitzkrieg strategy over French defence strategy. The West German military historian Friedrich Ruge holds, for example, that the outcome of the Western campaign was a foregone conclusion due to the _-_-_
~^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 3. p. 89 (in Russian).
87 ``operative action and surprise tactics and to the good use of the new weapons" by the German command.^^1^^ The American historian Jeffrey Clarke considers that the outcome of the battle of France was determined by "the concentration of German armor and vehicles in the panzer divisions and panzer corps". He interprets the victory of the Nazi troops as a sound strategic plan of attack on France which "put his [Guderian's] long-held theories about armor into practice in leading the German advance to the sea''.^^2^^ Thus the entire course of the armed struggle in the West in 1940 is presented as the triumph of the Wehrmacht, while the reasons for France's defeat are put down to the ineptitude of her generals.Of course, the military factor played an important part in the defeat of the Anglo-French coalition. In its West European campaign the German command succeeded in carrying out its Blitzkrieg strategy by the careful preparation for and the suddenness of its attack, by the massive use of armour and air force. The main Nazi force broke through the Belgian Ardennes unresisted, and struck at the rear of the Anglo-French troops which had moved into northern Belgium where as the Anglo-French command had mistakenly thought the enemy would deliver his main strike.
On March 20 the German tanks reached the English Channel, splitting the front of the Western allies. In a report to the French War Minister, General Gamelin wrote in those critical days: "The emergence of German armour divisions, and their ability to break through our defences over a broad front, were the main strategic factor. The massive use of armour by the Germans paralysed all attempts to close the breach and each time tore apart the chain of defences set up to hold up the advancing enemy. The defence measures could not be promptly carried out because of the lack of sufficient mechanised units and formations."^^3^^ Having thus wrecked the strategic _-_-_
^^1^^ Der 2. Weltkrieg. Bilder. Daten. Dokumente, S. 178.
~^^2^^ The Simon and Schuster Encyclopedia of World War II, pp. 202, 206.
~^^3^^ General Gamelin, Servir, Vol. Ill, p. 424.
88 defence plans of the allies, and having defeated them in the north, the German armies turned south in early June, overran the hastily erected French defences along the rivers Somme and Aisne and struck at the rear of the Maginot Line which had until then been thought impregnable. The fall of the Maginot defences became the symbol of the collapse of the Third French Republic.But it would be wrong, of course, to pretend that the defeat of the Anglo-French coalition was due to the military factor alone. Its defeat was inevitable, and due primarily to the foreign policy of the Western powers. Their numerous concessions to the aggressors, their refusal to uphold the Soviet proposals to create a collective security system, their outright betrayal of the peoples of Czechoslovakia and Poland, and finally their plans of aggression against the USSR during the phony war-all served to block the creation of an alliance of states which could have halted the aggression of the fascist bloc countries. The policy of compromise at the expense of the Soviet Union was at the bottom of the wait-and-see strategy of the Western allies whereby they gave the enemy a free hand in prosecuting the war on his own terms.
One of the factors behind the military success of the Nazis in 1940 was the weakness of the Anglo-French coalition, which failed to stand the test of war. The ruling elite in Britain, which had taken the leading position in the military alliance with France, had planned in line with its old tradition to have other countries pull their chestnuts out of the fire. The British put up a small contingent of its troops and air force on the continent against Nazi Germany. When the German armoured units broke through to the English Channel via the Ardennes, creating a dangerous situation, the military and political leaders of Britain refused to give its ally additional assistance with troops and materiel and left it to the mercy of fate. Already on May 19, the British command had begun working on its secret plans (codenamed Dynamo) for returning its expeditionary corps to the British Isles. On May 27 this plan was put into effect. By June 4, more than 330,000 British soldiers had been 89 shipped back home from Dunkirk and adjacent coastal areas.
A number of historians, especially British, try to present the evacuation of the British troops as a wise strategic manoeuvre. According to Peter Calvocoressi and Guy Wint, the evacuation of Dunkirk "was a triumph for the British navy''.^^1^^ Frederick Grossmith is quite definite that "at Dunkirk, Germany lost the war" and that "Britain ensured ... freedom from Hitlerism and enslavement''.^^2^^
The fact is, first, that the evacuation of the British troops from France made it a lot easier for the German command to carry on with the war in the West. On the one hand, this helped the Nazis to release their forces that had been operating in the northeast of France and use them for an offensive southwards into the French heartland, where the French command, given enough time, might still have organised a stable defence. On the other hand, the German victory increased the defeatist sentiments of the ruling elite in France and in this way opened the way to seizure of power by the arrantly capitulatory elements headed by Petain and Laval, who did not conceal their intention to make peace with Nazi Germany.
Second, the evacuation of the British troops via Dunkirk where they left about 700 tanks and a mass of other materiel to the enemy, has since been variously interpreted in Britain herself. Winston Churchill wrote in his memoirs that after the "Dunkirk miracle" the British troops lost much of their former strength: "Our armies at home [in Britain] were known to be almost unarmed except for rifles.... Months must pass before our factories could make good even the munitions lost at Dunkirk."^^3^^
One of the reasons for the defeat of France was the reactionary internal policy of its ruling elite who, in the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Peter Calvocoressi and Guy Wint, Total War. Causes and Courses of the Second World War. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 1979, p. 123.
~^^2^^ Frederick Grossmith, Dunkirk-A Miracle of Deliverance. Bachman & Turner Ltd., London, 1979, pp. 66, 114.
~^^3^^ Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War. Cassell & Co. Ltd., London, 1951, Vol. 2, p. 226.
90 words of one of the leaders of the French Communist Party, Etienne Fajon, "sacrificed national defence and collective security for the sake of the reactionary and defeatist privileged caste''.^^1^^ They used martial law declared in September 1939 for further abridging the already abridged bourgeois democracy, for banning the French Communist Party and related organisations, and for routing progressive trade unions. The British historian Anthony Adamthwaite writes about the absence of national unity in France,^^2^^ but he says nothing about the fact that the French government, which advocated collusion with Nazi Germany on an anti-Soviet basis, did nothing to halt the activities of proGerman elements and organisations in France. Fear that the struggle of the French patriots against fascism could develop into a struggle for revolutionary changes paralysed the French ruling elite, which could no longer steer the ship of state.After the capitulation of France the first immediate goal of the German strategists was preparations for war against the Soviet Union. Their second goal was to bring Britain to heel and force it-having lost her allies-to sign a peace treaty on terms suitable to Germany. On June 30, several days after fighting had died down in France, Franz Haider, the chief of the General Staff of the land forces, made this entry in his diary: "We are now looking due East.... We will yet have to demonstrate our military force to Britain before it yields and gives us a free hand in the East."^^3^^ On July 1 fi the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht issued a directive for Operation Sealion. Under this operation the German troops in Western Europe began to prepare for the _-_-_
^^1^^ Quoted from the Preface to: Fernand Grenier, Journal de la drdle de guerre (septembre 1939-juillet 1940). Editions sociales, Paris, 1969, pp. 9-10.
^^2^^ Anthony Adamthwaite, France and the Coming of the Second World War 1936--1939. Frank Class, London, 1977, pp. 356--357.
^^3^^ Generaloberst Haider, Kriegstagebuch, Band I, S. 375.
91 invasion of Britain. "The French, Belgian and Dutch ports were crammed with craft of every description. Embarkation and debarkation exercises went on without pause."^^1^^ Two months after the evacuation of British troops from Dunkirk the Nazi leaders made still another decision: to start massive bombings of British cities, while demonstratively continuing the preparations for Operation Sealion.The Nazis began their air offensive against Britain on August 13, 1940. British fighters and other air defences joined in the fighting which reached its peak in the middle of September 1940. After that the heavy losses of its air power over Britain^^2^^ compelled the German High Command lo abandon any further daytime air attacks and reduce its operations to night bombings of British industrial centres. Thus the Na/i hopes that the British people would lose their nerve under the bombs never materialised.
It would be wrong, however, to consider Britain and not the USSR the main Nazi goal in 1940, and to pronounce the Battle of Britain "one of the fateful battles of history", and one of the most decisive victories in the Second World War, which forced Hitler to call off Operation Sealion.^^3^^ It would likewise be wrong to believe that the defeat of the Wehrmacht in the Battle of Britain compelled Germany to carry the war to the East in order to rout the USSR which was nothing but a continental sword in the hands of Great Britain.^^4^^ The British air defence did beat back massive Nazi air attacks. The population of Britain held out against the enemy with fortitude. But the reason the German command gave up the idea of landing on the British Isles _-_-_
~^^1^^ The Fatal Decisions. William Sloane Associates. New York, 1956, p. 16. .
~^^2^^ In August-September 1940 Germany lost 1,100 aircraft over Britain, as against 650 British aircraft (see Peter Calvocoressi and Guy Wint, Total War, p. 143).
~^^3^^ Hanson W. Baldwin, The Crucial Yean 1939--1941. The World at War. Harper & Row Publishers, New York, 1976, p. 152; Der 2. Weltkrieg, S. 188; The Simon and Schuster Encyclopedia of World War II, p. 81.
~^^4^^ Michael Freund, Deutsche Geschichte, S. 1354--1355; Klaus Reinhardt, Die Wende vor Moskau. Das Scheitern der Strategic Hitlers in Winter 1941/42. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1972, S. 15--16.
92 was primarily that they sought to throw all they could against the USSR, the main obstacle to world domination. Fritz Hesse, a former German diplomat, an expert working on "the British problem", cites the following fact in his memoirs. In the autumn of 1940, the Chief-of-Staff of the German air force drafted an order for transferring to Flanders the air units which were intended for war against the USSR and which were then stationed in Poland. The air force command tried to assure Hitler that with the help of these aircraft Germany would be able to break Britain's resistance. Significantly, Hitler did not sign this order, saying that "nobody dared make free with the air force set aside specially for this purpose''.^^1^^After the defeat of France the Nazi General Staff concentrated on preparations for a treacherous attack on the Soviet Union, which, incidentally, was originally planned for the autumn of 1940. However, at the end of July 1940, Hitler, acting on the advice of his generals, decided to put off his Eastern campaign until the spring of 1941.^^2^^ On July 31, 1940, General Haider wrote down in his diary these words of Hitler's: "If Russia is smashed, Britain will lose its last hope. Then Germany will dominate in Europe and in the Balkans.... Russia must be liquidated. Deadline: the spring of 1941.... Camouflage: Spain, North Africa, England.''^^3^^
Now for the so-called preventive war that Germany allegedly had to fight against the USSR. This version is still current among some of the historians who expound extremely reactionary anti-Soviet views. Ugo Walendy, W. Glasebock and Erich Helmdach present the measures taken by the Soviet Union to strengthen its frontiers in the 1930s as a preparation for an invasion of Central Europe. A self-- _-_-_
~^^1^^ Fritz Hesse, Das Vorspiel zitm Kriege. Englandberichte und Erlebnisse tines Tatzeugen 1935--1945. Duffel-Verlag, Leoni am Starnberger See, 1979, S. 237.
~^^2^^ James Lucas, War on the Eastern Front 1941--1945. The German Soldier in Russia. Jane's Publishing Company, London, 1979, pp. 3-4.
~^^3^^ Generaloberst Haider, Kriegstagebuch. Band II. W. Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart, 1963,5. 49,50.
93 styled American military historian, General MacCloskey, holds that "Hitler, fighting the British in the West could not accept the Russian expansion"^^1^^. Quoting some mythical intelligence reports, the British historian David Irving says that "the Russians were going to invade Germany".^^2^^ A similar version has been used by some Japanese historians (Takushiro Hattori for one) to justify Japan's aggressive actions against the USSR.The "preventive war" version does not bear serious discussion. The myth of a preventive war is given the lie by the peaceful foreign policy of the Soviet Union in the prewar years and its consistent struggle at that time for a collective security system in Europe and Asia in order to curb the aggressors. Also well known are the documents from the Nazi archives which shed light on the preparations for a treacherous attack on the USSR. It should be noted that practically , all the leading Western historians dissociate themselves from this story of a German preventive war against the Soviet Union. B. H. Liddell Hart, for example, writes that when the German troops had already crossed the Soviet border "the generals found little sign of Russian offensive preparations near the front, and thus saw that Hitler had misled them".^^3^^
The war that the Nazis waged against Britain at the time they were preparing for an attack on the USSR gradually deteriorated to a "diversionary operation" which was meant to conceal the preparations for a war against the Soviet Union. Beginning September 1940, the Nazis-eased off on their bombing raids and by February 1941, had reduced them to a minimum. Whatever hopes the Nazis still had of making Britain change her foreign policy as a result of the air raids these were related to the fact that many influential members of the British ruling elite were still strongly inclined to compromise with Hitler and his inner _-_-_
~^^1^^ Monro MacCloskey, Planning for Victory-World War II. Richards Rosen Press, New York, 1970, p. 18.
~^^2^^ David Irving, Hitler's War. The Viking Press, New York, 1977, p. 137.
~^^3^^ B. H. Liddell Hart, History of the Second World War. G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1971, p. 1.55.
94 circle.^^1^^ This circumstance was at the back of the Hess mission to Britain in May, 1941.^^2^^A well-informed British author, F. W. Winterbotham, writes that when France was practically out of the way, the Reich "obviously wanted peace in the West before he [Hitler] set out on the great mission... - the destruction of Communist Russia".^^3^^ The West German historian Janusz Piekalkiewicz has also come to the conclusion that after the decision had been made to start direct preparations for an attack on the USSR, the war in the West was put on a backburner in the plans of the German leaders.^^4^^
Some British historians claim that the Battle of Britain prevented Hitler from concentrating all of his forces against the USSR.^^5^^ However, they fail to provide enough facts in support of their thesis. The air war between Britain and Germany did not bring about any substantial change in the strategic situation in Western Europe following the defeat of France and did not prevent the Nazis from concentrating their invasion forces on the Soviet frontier. In the summer of 1941 the British army engaged two German divisions in North Africa.^^6^^
_-_-_^^1^^ For details see: V. A. Sekistov, War and Politics, Moscow, 1970, pp. 128--129 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ On May 10, 1941, Rudolf Hess, who was second in command in the Nazi party after Hitler himself, parachuted from an airplane he flew over Britain, landing outside the estate of Lord Hamilton, who was very close to the King. Staking all on the Munichites and the old antiSoviet aspirations of Prime Minister Churchill, this Nazi emissary acting on behalf of Hitler proposed that Britain sign a peace treaty with Germany and take part in a joint campaign against the USSR. This time, however, no deal was made. With Western Europe under the heel of the invaders and the British people at war with Nazi Germany, the Hess mission was doomed. The British government could see very well that if Germany succeeded in completing its Drang nach Osten as planned, Britain would then have no chance to survive. Hess was arrested. In 1946 he was tried by the Nuremberg International Tribunal and sentenced to life imprisonment.
~^^3^^ F. W. Winterbotham, The Ultra Secret. Harper & Row Publishers. New York, 1974, p. 36.
^^4^^ Janusz Piekalkiewicz, Luftkrieg 1939--1945. Sudwest Verlag, Munchen, 1978, S. 159.
~^^5^^ Peter Calvocoressi and Guy Wint, Total War, p. 144.
~^^6^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol, 4, 1975, pp. 20--21 (in Russian).
95The early period of the war showed that neither Britain nor France was in a position to repulse the fascist aggressors, which was a logical outcome of the phony war waged by the ruling elite, since this war was nothing but an updated version of the prewar policy of appeasement. As a result, the Nazis and their allies, over the first twenty-two months of the war, took control over almost the whole of capitalist Europe with its tremendous manpower and industrial resources. The policy of appeasement of the fascist aggressors and of instigating an attack on the USSR proved to be catastrophic for Britain^ France and many other countries of Europe.
With militarist Japan pursuing a course of aggression against the United States, the situation in the Far East rapidly deteriorated. Her immediate aim was to capture Uncontrolled territories in the Pacific.
According to many American historians the United States pursued, in the 1940--1941 period, a brinkmanship policy in order to contain expanding Japanese aggression. To bear out this contention, they refer to the government decision to curtail U.S. trade with Japan, to step up assistance to Chiang Kai-shek, and then to concentrate its navy in Hawaii and freeze Japanese assets in the United States. Compromise with Japan was possible provided "American security and principles" were ensured in Asia and the Pacific, which in a less euphemistic form means the strategic and colonial positions of the United States and its potential allies (China, Britain, France and Holland) in that part of the world.^^1^^
According to these historians, the main reasons that drew the United States into the war were events in other parts of the globe, especially in Europe, which were outside U.S. control and for which the administration could bear no responsibility. If the analysts differ at all, it is only on the _-_-_
^^1^^ Quoted from: America and the Origins of World War II, p. 11.
96 interpretation of the views of this or that political or military figure of the period. Some historians say that State Secretary Cordell Hull was more cautious in the pursuit of the "tough" political line towards Japan, than, say, Henry Stimson, Frank Knox or Henry Morgenthau who were insisting on more resolute measures and tried to bend Roosevelt to this course of action. Others believe that Roosevelt overestimated the influence of his opposition. However, these individual assessments do not affect in any substantial way the basic concept of the U.S. entry into the Second World War. This prevalent concept is exhaustively illustrated in the book Command Decision published by the military history department of the Army. Louis Morton, one of the contributors, gives the above problems most of his attention.He makes a detailed step-by-step analysis of the escalating Japanese aggression in Asia and puts his own interpretation on America's attitude to Japan in those days. "Japan's action in China was in violation of all existing treaties and, in the American view, the only solution to the China Incident was the complete withdrawal of Japanese forces from China."^^1^^ Of a slightly different view is H.-A. Jacobsen who insists that "The United States also contributed to the outbreak of war in the Pacific (by its tough economic policies, among other things). This, of course, does not absolve Japan of the responsibility for its action on December 7, 1941."^^2^^
The tendency to whitewash the imperialist policy of the USA gives birth to another tendency, that of concealing the brutality and avarice of the Japanese monopoly capitalists who tried to cover their predatory actions and plans with anti-communist propaganda, pan-Asiatic slogans and spurious protestations of their readiness to grant independence to oppressed nations. Morton takes great pains not _-_-_
^^1^^ Louis Morton, "Japan's Decisions for Weir" in: Command Decisions. Ed. by Kent Roberts Greenfield. Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, Washington, 1960, p 101.
~^^2^^ H.-A. Jacobsen, Von der Strategie der Gewalt zur Politik der Fnedenssederung, S. 53.
97 to sound offensive in passages dealing with the predatory plans of the Japanese militarists spearheaded against the United States, as seen here: "The Japanese, it must be emphasized, did not seek the total defeat of the United States and had no intention of invading this country."^^1^^ But was this really so? Later we shall speak about the German plans for the conquest of the American continent, and we have no grounds for thinking that the Japanese aggressors had no such plans. The commander of Japan's navy Admiral Yamamoto wrote soon after Japan had joined in the war "that it would not be enough 'to take Guam and the Philippines, not even Hawaii and San Francisco'. To gain victory ... they [the Japanese] would have 'to march into Washington and sign the treaty in the White House'."^^2^^ As a well-informed historian, Morton understands that he could not keep silent about this statement of Yamamoto's, but in his wording and interpretation this bluntly worded intention of the Japanese militarists to invade U.S. territory sounds almost noble. He writes, "They [the Japanese] planned to fight a war of limited objectives... To the Japanese leaders this seemed an entirely reasonable view. But there were fallacies in this concept which Admiral Yamamoto had pointed out when he wrote that it would not be enough 'to take Guam and the Philippines, not even Hawaii and San Francisco'."^^3^^ There is an obvious desire to reduce the differences between Japan and the United States, and to mutually "circumscribe" their expansionist imperialist goals for world domination, an attempt to make this biased interpretation of history serve present-day U. S.-Japanese relations.Louis Morton is the most influential semi-official interpreter of the U.S. entry into the war with Japan. His own report United States and Japan 1937--1941: Changing Patterns of Historical Interpretation (Washington, 1971), calls attention to the folio wing:
_-_-_^^1^^ Command Pensions, p. 122.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 123.
~^^3^^ Ibid., pp. 122--123.
98First, a statement of the fact that the problem has not yet been sufficiently studied. Second, recognition of the growing influence of Marxist historiography and of its concept that the United States sought to channel the Japanese in a northerly direction, against the Soviet Union. Third, the influence of the "New Left", who put forth their own interpretation of the origins of the war between the United States and Japan. Morton writes that the works of William Williams and many of his followers (also exponents of this school, such as Lloyd C.Gardner, D.Bernstein, and Gabriel Kolko) put the emphasis on the economic factors and on the interconnection between the internal problems of industrialised society and its foreign policy. Fourth, the need to study the role of the United States' military circles in the events under review. The role of the Japanese military circles, Morton states, has been studied exhaustively, but that of the American military circles is still open to investigation. According to Morton, this is happening most likely because in the United States the military play a subsidiary role in shaping foreign policy.
In the concluding part of his report Morton does not sound convincing enough. He elaborately enumerates all the existing schools and trends and sets out their concepts, but fails to put his own evaluation on them. For instance, he does not provide a clear-cut answer to such cardinal questions as which concept of the outbreak of the war between the USA and Japan is more objective? Who started the war-the United States or Japan?
Historians of more reactionary views have espoused a fundamentally different concept. In their opinion the Axis powers posed no threat either to the United States or to American interests. Roosevelt, they say, was deliberately steering the United States into war and deceived the American people about the true goals of his policy with words about peace. According to these historians, Roosevelt stoked the flames of war in Europe, provoked a clash between the United States and Japan in Asia, thus pushing America into war "through the back door".^^1^^
_-_-_^^1^^ The origins of the Pacific war are discussed by an active "revisionist", Charles Tansill, in his book Back Door to War. The Roosevelt Foreign __NOTE__ Footnote cont. on page 100. 99 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1984/WWII279/20070928/199.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2007.10.02) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+
The immediate threat coming from the Axis powers resulted, according to these historians, from the near-sighted and instigatory policy of the United States itself. This policy reached its climax when, in their words, the United States government froze Japanese assets on July 26, 1941, and delivered a note to Japan on November 26, 1941, which they refer to as an ultimatum. These two acts, they claim, forced Japan to start hostilities. Setting forth their version of the military aspect of the problem these historians clear the U.S. armed forces command of the Pearl Harbor disaster and put the blame squarely on Marshall, Stark, Stimson and Knox, whose top military posts in Washington allegedly gave them access to information on the imminent attack on Pearl Harbor but who refrained from taking the necessary counter-measures so that they could use this attack as a pretext for plunging the United States into war. Contrary to the official American version, these historians conclude that the United States "drew itself into the war'', and that the American involvement was not in any way consequent on the situation in the world.
The books written since about the events immediately predating the Pacific war put the spotlight on the U.S.-- Japanese talks which were held in Washington from the spring of 1941 until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Unlike the historians of the official trend, most of whom try to substantiate the American position at the talks, the " revisionists" blame Roosevelt and Hull, directly and by implication, for deliberately exacerbating the situation which eventually exploded into war.
Professor Paul Schroeder of the University of Illinois thinks that the talks in Washington were foiled by the evolution of the American position on the Sino-Japanese conflict. In his words the version played up by the "court historians" _-_-_ __NOTE__ Footnote cont. from page 99. Policy, 1933--1941 (H. Regnery Co., Chicago, 1952). Also in: Hans Louis Trefousse, Germany and American Neutrality, 1939--1941 (Octagon Books, New York, 1969); Leonard.Baker, Roosevelt and Pearl Harbor (Macmillan, New York, 1970); James H. Herzog, Closing the Open Door: American-Japanese Diplomatic Negotiations 1936--1941 (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 1973); Japan's Foreign Policy,1868--1941 (ed. by James William Morley, Columbia University Press, New York, 1974).
100 that the United States did not modify its position at the talks has been developed at the State Department.^^1^^Contrary to Basil Rauch who believes that "Japan in the spring and summer of 1941 would accept no diplomatic arrangement which did not give it everything that it might win in the Far East by aggression'',^^2^^ and to Herbert Feis who, with certain qualifications, shares this point of view,^^3^^ Schroeder insists that as time went on, the two sides at the Washington talks markedly altered their positions. According to Schroeder, "Japan was clearly asking for less, and the United States was demanding more...".^^4^^
He does not produce sufficient proof in support of this view. At the same time, in their attempts to discredit Roosevelt, Hull and the official historians their opponents on the right often operate with basically correct facts. For example, ridiculing the statement made by Hull's political adviser Stanley K. Hornbeck that "the intentions of the United States in regard to the Western Pacific and Eastern Asia have always been peaceful intentions'', Schroeder remarks sarcastically: "The American acquisitions of Hawaii, Guam, and even of the Philippines, Mr. Hornbeck is careful to point out, are also in reality clear evidences of a peaceful, liberal attitude.''^^5^^ Though based on facts, this criticism must be taken with a grain of salt. The point is that while concentrating attention on the vulnerability of the apologia for the foreign and military policies of the Roosevelt Administration, the reactionary historians try to build up an anti-Roosevelt concept. All their discussions eventually boil down to the pro-fascist thesis that the policy of the United States before and during the war brought forth a much more serious threat to peace and _-_-_
~^^1^^ Paul Schroeder, "The Axis Alliance and Japanese-American Relations, 1941" in: America and the Origins of World War II, pp. 144, 145.
~^^2^^ Basil Rauch, Roosevelt. From Munich to Pearl Harbor. A Study in the Creation of a Foreign Policy. Creative Age Press, New York, 1950, p. 396.
~^^3^^ Herbert Feis, The Road to Pearl Harbor. The Coming of the War Between the United States and Japan. Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1950, pp. 171--172.
~^^4^^ America and the Origins of World War II, p. 148.
~^^5^^ Ibid., p. 146.
101 security in the form of communist Russia and her allies.The attempts of the bourgeois historians to at least somehow justify the policy of appeasement cannot conceal the catastrophic results of this policy for the whole world. For Europe in the middle of 1941 these were the enslavement of twelve countries and the mortal danger to Britain. By that time the policy of appeasement of militarist Japan had already run into crisis. The concessions that the United States had made to the Japanese militarists so they could have their hands free to unleash a war against the Soviet Union, also the Japanese occupation of vast areas in Asia encouraged Japan to commit new acts of aggression.
All this goes to show that the examination and interpretation of the causes of the Second World War by bourgeois historians points to their utter rejection of the laws of historical development, and to their attempts to clear the imperialists, who are chiefly to blame, of all responsibility and to put in a bad light the peaceful policy of the USSR, the dauntless struggle of the Soviet Union against the fascist threat. Bourgeois historians are thus confusing the issue of the origins of the Second World War. This can be explained primarily by their class positions. The available material, which would otherwise cover the problem in full, is not examined objectively. Instead, it is treated only within the narrow limits of blinkered bourgeois ideology and a priori judgements in support of the anti-Soviet policies of imperialism.
In February 1945 British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden speaking in Parliament on the results of the Crimean Conference of the leaders of the USSR, the USA and Britain, said: "Can anyone doubt that, if we had had, in 1939, the unity between Russia, this country and the United States that we cemented at Yalta, there would not have been the present war?''^^1^^ A belated conclusion? Nevertheless it is still very edifying for those in the West who ignore the lessons of history.
_-_-_^^1^^ Parliamentary Debates. Fifth Series. Vol. 408, House of Commons, London, 194,5, col. 1514.
[102] __NUMERIC_LVL1__ CHAPTER TWO __ALPHA_LVL1__ AGGRESSION AND DISASTER __ALPHA_LVL2__ [introduction.]On June~22, 1941, Nazi Germany and its allies carried out a surprise attack on the Soviet Union with a tremendous combined force of 190 divisions, more than 4,000 tanks, about ,5,000 aircraft and over 200 warships. In some decisive directions of advance, the aggressors had multiple superiority in military strength.
The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union continued 1418 days and nights. The suddenness and the treacher) of the attack gave the aggressors the temporary strategic initiative and enabled them to occupy a large part of Soviet territory. In a situation which was extremely complicated and dangerous for the Soviet Union, for the cause of freedom and democracy in the whole world, the Soviet people and their armed forces succeeded in overcoming the heavy reverses of the initial period of the war and in turning the tide.
Armed struggle is the main feature of any war as a social phenomenon. In the Second World War, the long and difficult road to victory over the aggressors lay primarily through the armed struggle on the Soviet-German front. In the United States and Britain the war on the Soviet-German front is often referred to as "the unknown war'', in the Federal Republic of Germany it is called "the unforgotten war'', or "the war in the East''.
Distortion of facts with regard to the decisive contribution made by the Soviet Union to the rout of the fascist aggressors is the underlying feature of much historical writing in the West. With its markedly anti-Soviet bias this falsification at the same time serves to support the myth of the 103 ``dominant" role of the United States in the Second World War.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ MOSCOW, STALINGRAD, KURSKThe war that the German Nazis started against the Soviet Union was the fiercest offensive of the forces of world imperialism against socialism, the heaviest trial the Soviet state ever went through. In that war the future of the USSR, the future of world civilisation, progress and democracy was at stake.
None of the other theatres of the Second World War (North Africa, Italy, Western Europe, the Pacific Ocean) ever saw such continuous, uninterrupted and intensive military operations as the Soviet-German front. It is this front that tied down up to 70 per cent of Nazi Germany's divisions. Out of every four soldiers of the Hitler Wehrmacht an average of three were engaged in the fighting on the Eastern front and only one on the Western. A total of 507 Nazi divisions were destroyed, routed or taken prisoner. The Soviet troops also destroyed most of the enemy materiel: 167,000 cannon, 48,000 tanks and assault guns, about 77, 000 aircraft. The allies of Nazi Germany lost no less than 100 divisions on the Eastern front. The armies of the United States, Britain and other members of the anti-Hitler coalition put out of action 176 divisions, or under one-third of the total of routed divisions of Nazi Germany and her allies. German casualties on the Soviet-German front constituted more than 73 per cent of its total losses in the Second World War. Here too the entire military strategy of Nazi Germany foundered and its military machine broke down.
The monstrous crimes committed by the Hitlerites on the territory of the USSR have no match in history. The fascist hordes razed to the ground tens of thousands of Soviet cities, towns and villages. They killed and tortured men, women, 104 children and old folk. The cruelty to which the Nazis subjected the population of other countries they occupied was surpassed many times over on Soviet territory. All these crimes were recorded and authenticated in documentary form by the Extraordinary State Commission for the Investigation into the Savagery of the Fascist German Invaders and their Accomplices, and were all brought to the knowledge of the world.
The Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union took a toll of more than 20 million people killed and cost our country about 30 per cent of its national wealth.
What were the reasons for such a vast struggle, unprecedented in scope and ferocity, and what were the reasons for Nazi brutality, unequalled anywhere in human history? To answer this question one must, in the first place, bear in mind that the war waged by Nazi Germany and its allies against the USSR was no ordinary war in the conventional sense of the term. The Soviet Union was the main stumbling block to German imperialist domination of the world. At the same time German nazism, as the main striking force of international reaction, wanted this war against the USSR not only to capture its territory, but also to destroy the Soviet social and state system. In other words, German nazism also pursued its class goals in that war. Therein lies the difference between the war that Germany waged against the USSR and the wars which it fought against capitalist countries. Class hatred for the world's first socialist country, the predatory instinct and the vicious essence of fascism were fused in Germany's policy, strategy and methods of warfare.
According to Nazi plans, the Soviet Union was to be carved and liquidated as a state. Its territory was to be divided into four Reichskommissariats, or German provinces. Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev and a number of other cities were to be blown up, flooded, wiped off the face of the earth. "This is a war of extermination... In the East, harshness today means lenience in the future,'' said Hitler at a meeting of his military council on March 30, 1941.^^1^^ The Nazi _-_-_
~^^1^^ Max Domarus, Hitler. Reden und Proklamationen. 1932--1945. Band I Hbd. 2, Suddeutscher Verlag, Miinchen, 1965, S. 1682.
105 leaders demanded that not only Soviet armymen be killed, but also the civilian population of the USSR. Their aim was the physical extermination of most of the Soviet people, as proponents of Marxist-Leninist ideology. The soldiers and officers of the Wehrmacht were issued with leaflets which read: "Kill every Russian, every Soviet male or female you see. Don't stop just because it is an old man or woman, a girl or a boy. Kill! By doing so you will survive, ensure yourself a secure future and make yourself famous for ages to come.''The initial stages in the planning of aggression against the Soviet Union go back to the mid-1980s, a long time before the Second World War. The war against Poland and the campaign in Northern and Western Europe temporarily relegated the Eastern plans of the German General Staff to the background, although it never lost sight of the continuing preparations for war against the USSR. The Nazi leaders stepped up the tempo of these preparations after the fall of France when they thought they had ensured a stable rear for the future war and had sufficient resources for its prosecution.
On December 18, 1940, Hitler signed Directive No. 21, codenamed Barbarossa, which set forth the general idea and the initial instructions on the course of war against the USSR. The Barbarossa Plan was based on Blitzkrieg strategy. According to this plan, the Soviet Union was to be defeated within 8-10 weeks, even before the end of the war against Britain. The main strategic targets were Leningrad, Moscow, the central industrial legion and the Donets coal fields. A special place in this plan was assigned to the seizure of Moscow, which was' supposed to conclude the campaign.
To prosecute this war the Nazis set up an aggressive military coalition based on the triple alliance formed in 1940 between Germany, Italy and Japan. Also drawn into these aggressive plans were Romania, Finland and Hungary. The Nazis were aided by the reactionary ruling elite in Bulgaria and by the puppet regimes in Slovakia and Croatia, and also benefited from cooperation they received from Spain, the Vichy regime in France, from Portugal and Turkey. The Nazis made intensive use of the 106 economic and manpower resources of the countries they had seized and occupied: Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, Holland, Belgium, France, Yugoslavia and Greece. The economies of the neutral countries of Europe were, to all intents and purposes, geared to the expansionist interests of Germany. This means that Nazi Germany rallied the resources of almost all European countries for the realisation of its Barbarossa Plan-both its direct allies and the Nazi-occupied, dependent and neutral countries with a combined population of over 300 million.^^1^^
Hitler and other Nazi leaders were so sure of the plan's success that in the spring of 1941, with the attack on the Soviet Union only a few weeks away, they proceeded to develop in great detail their further aggressive designs for world domination. In special trains that served as mobile headquarters (called the Asie and the Amerika) Nazi army strategists mapped out the directions of global attack by their armies. An entry made in the office diary of Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) on February 17, 1941, contained Hitler's demand that "the successful conclusion of the Eastern campaign should be followed up by the capture of Afghanistan and an advance on India.'' Acting upon these instructions the OKW proceeded to develop long-range operations. The Nazis intended to carry out these operations late in the autumn of 1941, and In the winter of 1941--1942. The substance of these operations was set forth in draft Directive No. 32 "Preparations for the Post-Barbarossa Period" which was circulated in the army, air force and navy on June 11, 1941.
According to this project the Wehrmacht was to carry its war of conquest, after the defeat of the Soviet armed forces, to the British colonies and some independent countries in the Mediterranean, Africa, the Middle East. It was also to invade the British Isles and launch military operations against America. Hitler's strategists thought that in the autumn of 1941 they would move their troops to start the conquest of Iran, Iraq, Egypt, the Suez Canal zone, and later of India _-_-_
^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 8, p. 255.
107 where they would join the Japanese armed forces. The Nazi leaders hoped that by annexing Spain and Portugal the German Reich would easily capture Gibraltar, cut Britain off from her raw material resources and lay siege to the Isles. The draft directive and other documents show that after the defeat of the USSR and the solution of the "British problem" the Nazis intended, in alliance with Japan, to seize the American continent. Invasion of Canada and the United States was planned by landing large sea-borne contingents on the eastern coast of North America from bases in Greenland, Iceland and the Azores and in Brazil, and on the western coast from the Aleutian and Hawaiian islands. The deadly menace spread over all mankind. The aggressors were convinced that the "lightning march" on the USSR would give them the key to world conquest.The German strategists were making predictions that the Soviet Union would fall almost immediately. Nazi General Giinther Blumentritt wrote in a report prepared for a meeting of the Army High Command on May 9, 1941: "The history of all wars in which the Russians took part shows that the Russian soldier is tough, indifferent to weather, undemanding, does not fear either blood or losses. This is why all the battles from King Frederick the Great down to the World War were soaked in blood. In spite of all these qualities of its troops the Russian empire never scored any victories. At present we have a vast numerical superiority.... Our troops have more field experience than the Russians.... We will face some hard fighting for about 8-14 days. Then success will not be long in coming, and we shall win.''^^1^^ Apart from a poor knowledge of history (for example, in 1759 at Kundersdorf Russian troops routed the army of Frederick the Great, whose hat, lost on the battlefield, is now on exhibit at a museum in Leningrad), the general demonstrated the kind of adventurism that was an underlying feature of military planning in Nazi Germany.
Typically, many Western political and military leaders in those days underestimated the strength of the Soviet _-_-_
~^^1^^ Klaus Reinhardt, Die Wende vor Moskau. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, SJuttgart, 1972, S. 21.
108 Union, and grossly overestimated Germany's own possibilities. When the Nazi command moved its troops against the Soviet Union, they predicted quick success for the Wehrmacht which had shortly before routed the AngloFrench coalition. The prevailing view in Britain was that the Germans would seize Russia in six to twelve weeks. U.S. Secretary of War Henry Stimson wrote in a letter to Roosevelt, June 23, 1941 that it would take Germany three months at the most to defeat the Soviet Union. But the Soviet people and their armed forces refuted all these predictions. After a long and arduous struggle they turned the tide of the war, threw back the enemy, and foiled the fascist plans for world domination.The reactionary analysts of the events on the Soviet-- German front are clearly inclined to denigrate their significance for the outcome of the Second World War, and to give a distorted picture of Soviet policy, strategy and military art. This applies first and before all to the battles of Moscow, Stalingrad and Kursk, which reversed the fortunes of the Second World War.
The summer and autumn of 1941 were particularly difficult, as three Nazi army groups-North, Centre and Southwedged deep into Soviet territory, laid siege to Leningrad, went as far north as the Soviet Arctic, and moved in the direction of Moscow, the Donbass coal fields, and the Crimea.
In the course of the strategic defence operations the Soviet troops held out against the pressure of the advancing enemy and themselves delivered powerful counter-strikes. Suffice it to say that in the first three weeks of the war the German troops were advancing some 20--30 km a day, whereas in the middle of July their speed dropped to 3.5-8 km a day, and later to even less. In September the enemy was halted outside Leningrad, and in November outside Rostov. Fighting fiercely for every inch of their land the Soviet troops acquitted themselves with courage and heroism. The stubborn defence of Brest and Kiev, Odessa and Sevastopol, Smolensk and Tula were the harbingers of 109 the early collapse of the Blitzkrieg against the USSR. The enemy lost 758,000 troops and more than 5,000 aircraft between June and November 1941.
In the autumn of 1941, the fiercest fighting was in the Moscow sector of the front.
The battle of Moscow (September 30, 1941-April 20, . 1942) has gone down in history as the beginning of the turning of the tide in the struggle against the Nazi onslaught.
Altogether on both sides, more than 2.8 million troops, about 2,000 tanks, more than 1,500 aircraft, 21,000 guns and mortars were engaged in the fighting.^^1^^ Sustaining tremendous losses the leading units of Army Group Centre reached the approaches to the Soviet capital at the end of November 1941. Here they were halted and put to rout.
On December 5, 1941, the Soviet troops launched a counteroffensive in the course of which they struck a crushing blow at Army Group Centre. As a result, 38 Nazi divisions were routed. The greatest losses were inflicted upon the enemy armoured units, which had been assigned the key role in the seizure of the Soviet capital.
By the end of April 1942, the casualties of the land forces of the Wehrmacht on the Soviet-German front exceeded 1,500,000, including 716,000 men of Army Group Centre. This is almost five times as great as the Nazi losses in Poland, in Northwestern and Western Europe and in the Balkans. Other German losses on the Eastern front were about 4,000 tanks and assault guns, more than 7,000 aircraft. To offset its depleted strength the Hitler command had to transfer 60 divisions and 21 brigades to the East. The Soviet troops liberated from the invaders more than 11,000 inhabited centres, among them such large cities as Kalinin and Kaluga. The enemy was pushed back 100--250 km away from Moscow.
The rout of the Nazi forces by the Red Army exploded the myth of the Wehrmacht's invincibility, and signified the utter collapse of the plans for a lightning war against the USSR. The victory at Moscow showed that the Soviet Union would _-_-_
^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 4, pp. 283, 284.
110 eventually win the war, in spite of some of the initial reverses.Progressive and freedom-loving people on all continents saluted the Soviet Army's victory at Moscow, which demonstrated to the whole world the stability of the Soviet socialist state and the fighting efficiency of its armed forces. The peoples of the Nazi-occupied countries were now looking to the Soviet Union as a force capable of saving the world from fascist enslavement. The progressive Italian political leader Roberto Battaglia pointed out that "the first military success of the Soviet Union ended the long period of indecision and bewilderment" on both sides of the Atlantic.^^1^^ Fernand Grenier, a member of the Central Committee of the French Communist Party, recalled that on the New Year's Eve of 1942 he and his friends picked up a radio broadcast from Moscow. "Kalinin's speech breathed confidence and vigour.... When at the end of the broadcast we heard the chimes of the Kremlin clock, tears welled up to our eyes. At that great hour Moscow was truly the hope and the heart of the world.''^^2^^ The victory at Moscow helped rally the forces of the anti-Hitler coalition and brought about a steady increase in its military might.
What a great response the victory at Moscow aroused all over the world can be judged from some impressions voiced at the time by state and military leaders in different countries. In a London radio broadcast on February 15, 1942, Winston Churchill said: "In those days Germany seemed to be tearing the Russian armies to pieces and striding on with growing momentum to Leningrad, to Moscow, to Rostov.... How do matters stand now?... The Russian armies are in the field.... They are advancing victoriously.... More than that: for the first time they have broken the Hitler legend. Instead of the easy victories and abundant booty ... he has found in Russia so far only disaster, failure, the shame of unspeakable crimes, the slaughter or _-_-_
~^^1^^ Roberto Battaglia, Storia della Resistenza italiana 8 settembre 1943--25 aprile 1945. Giulio Einaudi editore. Torino, 1953, p. 47.
~^^2^^ Fernand Grenier, C'Etait ainsi... 1940--1945. Editions Sociales, Paris, 1970, pp. 97--98.
111 loss of vast numbers of German soldiers....''^^1^^In a message to Stalin received in Moscow on December 16, 1941, President Roosevelt wrote: "I want to tell you once more about the genuine enthusiasm throughout the United States for the success of your armies in the defense of your great nation.''^^2^^
In a penetrating speech made over the London radio on January 20, 1942, General de Gaulle said: "The French people salute with enthusiasm the successes of the Russian people and their growing strength. For these successes are bringing France closer and closer to her desired goal: liberty and revenge.... To our common misfortune, the FrancoRussian alliance has over the centuries too often been plagued by obstacles and obstructions born of intrigue or incomprehension. Nevertheless, the need for such an alliance becomes increasingly clear at every turn of history.''^^3^^
The unprecedented heroism and staunchness of the Soviet soldiers and the whole Soviet nation, also the superb military skill of Soviet commanders were given their due by many outstanding personalities. For example, General Douglas MacArthur, Commander of the U.S. Armed Forces in the Pacific, wrote in February 1942: "During my lifetime I have participated in a number of wars and have witnessed others, as well as studying in great detail the campaigns of outstanding leaders of the past. In none have I observed such effective resistance to the heaviest blows of a hitherto undefeated enemy, followed by a smashing counter-attack which is driving the enemy back to his own land. The scale and grandeur of the effort mark it as the greatest military achievement in all history.''^^4^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Winston S. Churchill. His Complete Speeches. 1897--1963. Vol. IV (1935--1942). Chelsea House Publishers in association with R. R. Bowker Company, New York and London, 1974, pp. 6583--6584.
~^^2^^ Correspondence Between the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and Presidents of the USA and the Prime Ministers of Great Britain During the Great Patriotic War of 1941--1945. (Further referred to as Correspondence..^ Volume Two, Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1957, p. 18.
~^^3^^ Charles de Gaulle, Memoirs de guerre. Vol. 1, 1940--1942. Paris, Librairie Plon, 1954, pp. 546--547.
~^^4^^ Frederick L. Schuman, Soviet Politics at Home and Abroad. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, 1946, pp. 432--433.
112
__CAPTION__
Luftwaffe aircraft on a bombing raid over Uarsau-. September
1939
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The troops of the British expeditionary iorco taking up a position
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Nazi prisoners of war near Smolensk. 1941
aders
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The military parade in Moscow on November 7 1941. From Red Square
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A heavily wounded Soviet offccr urging his men onwards
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Scottish troops in counter-attack, t.l Alaincin, HM2
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Soviet patriots and their families filled the ranks of the resistance
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Fighting in the streets of Stalingrad. A
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Sovict troops on the streets of the liberated Stalingrad. February 4, 1943
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Soviet women at a munitions factory
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Field Marshal von Paulus, Commander of the 6th Army,
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In the assembly sliop of a Soviet aircraft plant
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At a Soviet tank-manufacturing plant
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Soviet warships of the Northern Fleet on a combat mission
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So"iet troops on the border with Romania. March 1944
The Battle of Moscow still engages the attention of Western historians, especially in recent years.
We shall start with some of the more objective evaluations.
Professor Alfred W. Turney (USA) writes that the stamina and courage of the Soviet troops foiled the elaborate plans that the Germans had worked out before the war for a lightning thrust to Moscow. He refers to the actions of the Soviet troops from the middle of October 1941 as forceful and daring. "The ferocity with which the Russians fought, even when hopelessly encircled, caused surprise, even consternation, at the German Armed Forces High Command.''^^1^^
Most of the Western historians cannot fully ignore the implications of the defeat of the Nazi armies at Moscow. However, in their works this event of world-wide significance is often lost like a needle in a haystack. Moreover, bourgeois authors often concentrate on the plans of the Hitler High Command, on the proposals of German generals made in the high echelons of the Nazi military hierarchy, also on the operations and battles as they were fought by the German armed forces, while, at the same time pushing the operations of the Soviet Army far into the background.
Many of them claim that the allied actions in North Africa and at sea in 1941--1942 had a greater impact on the course of the Second World War than the Battle of Moscow or the fighting on the Soviet-German front in general. In their analysis of the events of the winter of 1941--1942, bourgeois historians laid special emphasis on the entry of the United States into the Second World War. The attack on U.S. bases in the Pacific "brought the full potential of the United States into the European War'', wrote H. Wallin.^^2^^ Another American historian, Trumbull Higgins, writes that the Pearl Harbor attack left Hitler in a state of indecision.^^3^^ Such assertions have been made with the express purpose of _-_-_
^^1^^ Alfred W. Turney, Disaster at Moscow: Von Bock's Campaigns 1941--1942. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, 1970, p. 54.
~^^2^^ H. Wallin, Pearl Harbor. Naval History Division, Washington, 1968, p. 3.
~^^3^^ Trumbull Higgins, Hitler and Russia. The Macmillan Company, -New York, 19(>6, p. 193.
__PRINTERS_P_113_COMMENT__ 6---682 113 denigrating the heroic efforts of the Soviet people to repulse the Nazi onslaught in 1941, of belittling the significance of the Red Army victory at Moscow, and of justifying the strategy of the British and American leaders who already at that time regarded a defeat of the USSR in the war as a foregone conclusion and who entertained ill-based hopes that Germany would be brought to her knees by massive bombing raids, an economic blockade and limited offensive action.^^1^^The entry of the United States into the war was, of course, an act of great importance. But it was the Red Army that held out against the enemy and foiled the Nazi plans by assuming the counter-offensive in the winter of 1941--1942 and thereby ensured the groundwork for turning the tide of the Second World War. Beginning with June 1941, the Soviet Union bore the brunt of the fighting, for it had to deal with the overwhelming mass of the troops of Nazi Germany, the pivot of the aggressive fascist bloc.
The reasons for the failure of Hitler's plans for a Blitzkrieg against the USSR, the defeat of the Nazi troops at Moscow in the winter of 1941--1942 are simplified by most Western authors to, first, Hitler's political and military mistakes, second, unfavourable climatic conditions and the vast expanses of the Soviet Union, and, third, the assistance that the Soviet Union received from its allies in the war. These Western historians seem to have nothing to say about the military skill and heroism of the Soviet Army, the selfless determination of the entire Soviet nation to drive back the enemy at all costs.
The thesis that Hitler and nobody else was personally responsible for the defeat at Moscow is the most common in bourgeois historiography. It has been put forward by the Nazi ex-generals who, in the days of the war, served their Fiihrer with zeal and lauded his ``genius'', and even by some of the more ``liberal'' bourgeois historians including Turney who wrote: "Having made the strategic decision to attack and _-_-_
~^^1^^ American Military History. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, 1969, pp. 42.5-426.
114 destroy the Soviet Union, Hitler then proceeded to make a series of fatal errors in its implementation.''^^1^^These historians virtually keep silent about the fact that Hitler's plan of carrying the war to Russia was adventuristic to its very core, based as it was on the naive assumption that the Soviet Union was "a colossus with feet of clay''. However the fascist ring-leaders clearly underestimated the stability of the social and state system of the USSR, the might of the Soviet armed forces.
Turney writes that "in an effort to solve the dilemma, Hitler made his second fatal error... He halted the headlong advance to Moscow and directed the German forces to encircle and destroy huge concentrations of Russian forces in the Ukraine''^^2^^. Trevor Dupuy echoes this view, saying that "most crucial of all was his [Hitler's] failure to concentrate his forces on Moscow in the summer of 1941 ".^^3^^
These authors deliberately ignore the fact that the strategic plans of the Wehrmacht were foiled by the Red Army which had exhausted the enemy forces and threatened them with encirclement and ultimate destruction. Marshal Zhukov pointed out that if the Germans had not halted their advance on Moscow and had not diverted some of their forces to the Ukraine, the position of Army Group Centre would have been even worse. "For the GHQ Supreme Command reserves which in September were committed to fill the operative breaches in the southwestern sector of the front and in November to defend the near approaches to Moscow, could have been used for striking at the flanks and rear of the Army Group Centre as it advanced on Moscow.''^^4^^
Whereas Hitler's political and military miscalculations, according to many Western historians, were responsible for the defeat of Nazi strategy in the Battle of Moscow, the military failure was purely the result of the rigours _-_-_
^^1^^ Alfred W. Turney, Disaster at Moscow: Von Bock's Campaigns 194T-1942 p. XIII.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. XIV.
~^^3^^ Trevor Dupuy, The Military Life of Adolf Hitler. F. Watts, New York 1970, p. 98.
~^^4^^ G. K. Zhukov, Recollections and Reminiscences. Vol. 2, Moscow, 1978, p. 33 (in Russian).
115 of the Russian winter which frustrated the operations of the Nazi troops. "The German forces could not overcome the handicaps of nature, the breakdown of their supply system, and the dogged resistance of the Russian defenders,'' writes Turney.^^1^^ He is echoed by Leonard Cooper who insists that Hitler's advance was checked by impassable roads.^^2^^ About every Western publication for the mass reader features photographs of German tanks and vehicles stalled in mud. The wording of the captions under these pictures runs approximately like this: "The Russian winter slowed down the Nazi advance, the rains played havoc with the roads. People, horses and vehicles bogged down in the mire. The German Blitzkrieg was stopped.''This version was first circulated by Nazi propaganda. Back in December 1941, the German High Command issued a statement to the effect that the winter conditions had compelled the Germans to pass from mobile warfare to position warfare, and to reduce the frontline. The OKW Directive No. 39 of December 8, 1941, read: "The premature advent of a cold winter on the Eastern front and the ensuing problems of supplies have made it imperative to cancel all major offensive operations and to assume the defensive."^^3^^ After the war these arguments were taken up by bourgeois historians. Almost none of them fails to mention the ``fatal'' factors such as "mud, cold winter, bad roads, and the vast Russian expanses" which led to the defeat of the Nazi armies outside Moscow.
According to American and West German historians, the Russian "General Winter" put the Nazi forces at Moscow to rout. The editors of The Encyclopedia Americana believe that "possibly, had the cold not set in, the German armies would _-_-_
~^^1^^ Alfred W. Turney, Disaster at Moscow: von Bock's Campaigns 1941 -1942, p. XV.
~^^2^^ Leonard Cooper, Many Roads to Moscow. Three Historic Invasions. Hamish Hamilton, London, 1968, pp. 215--216.
^^3^^ Hitlers Weisungen fur die Kriegsfuhrung 1939--1945. Documente der Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht. Bernard & Graefe Verlag fur Wehrwesen, Frankfurt am Main, 1962, S. 171.
116 have battled their way through the mass of men...'' to Moscow.^^1^^Soviet historians have in many of their works proved wrong the assertions that the climatic conditions were the main reason for the defeat of the Nazi armies at Moscow. The point is that the rainy season in the autumn of 1941 was rather short and gave way to winter weather early in November. In the Moscow region the average temperature in November and December stood at minus 6-14°C.^^2^^ The bourgeois historians who studied the Battle of Moscow are undoubtedly familiar with the entry in the diary of Franz Haider, Chief of the General Staff of the Wehrmacht's land forces, made in August 1941: "The general situation makes it increasingly clear that we have underestimated the power of this colossus^-Russia. This contention applies to all (he economic and organisational aspects, to the means of communication and especially to the purely military possibilities of the Russians.''^^3^^ However, such conclusions which disclose the true reasons for the failure of the Nazi offensive on Moscow have not made their way into most of the works of the Western authors.
``No, it was not the rain and snow that stopped the Nazi troops at Moscow. The more than a million-strong elite Nazi force was crushed by the iron will, courage and heroism of the Soviet troops who were there to defend their people, their capital, their country,'' wrote Marshal Zhukov.^^4^^
In trying to explain the reasons for the collapse of the Blitzkrieg against the USSR some bourgeois historians overemphasise the significance of Anglo-American aid to the Soviet Union in that period. One analysis of the situation on the Soviet-German front says that the Allied support in 1941 "contributed ... to the ability of the Soviet military forces in general to continue their resistance. Lacking Allied support ... the Soviet economy might have been unable to supply adequate material to sustain the Soviet forces in _-_-_
^^1^^ The Encyclopedia Americana. Vol. 29, Americana Corporation, New York, 1968, p. 427; Wolfgang Paul, Erforener Sieg. Die Schlacht urn Moskau 1941/42. Bechtle Verlag, Munchen, 1975.
~^^2^^ Pravda, October 28, 1981.
~^^3^^ Generaloberst Haider, Kriegstagebuch. Band III., 1964, S. 170.
~^^4^^ G K Zhukov. Recollections and Reminiscences, Vol. 2, p. 33.
117 the field".^^1^^ Sumner Welles puts it even blunter, saying that U.S. military equipment "helped greatly to make possible the victory at Moscow".^^2^^Let us recall in this connection that in 1941 the Allied delivery of supplies was less than limited. Britain and the United States delivered to the USSR 750 aircraft, 501 tanks and some other weapons. This assistance could not have possibly matched the needs of the Soviet-German front, also because all this materiel arrived in Soviet ports in incomplete sets, and much of it damaged. Stalin wrote to Winston Churchill on November 8, 1941: "...The tanks, guns and aircraft are badly packed, some parts of the guns come in different ships and the aircraft are so badly crated that we get them in a damaged state.''^^3^^
In the opinion of the British historians J.R.M. Butler and J.MA. Gwyer, Britain and the United States did not wish "to see valuable war-material, which could be put to immediate use elsewhere, lost in the chaos of a collapsing Russian front".^^4^^ The Allies' wait-and-see position clearly showed that they did not believe the Soviet Union was strong enough to hold out against the enemy and win.
In spite of all these doubts, the Red Army, at the cost of tremendous losses, halted the advancing enemy, routing its main striking force and rolling it back from Moscow to the west.
The victory of the Soviet armed forces at Stalingrad holds a place in the history of the Second World War. _-_-_
~^^1^^ Walter Schwabedissen, The Russian Air Force in the Eyes of German Commanders. USAF Historical Studies, No. 175, Arno Press Inc., New York, 1968, p. 159.
~^^2^^ Sumner Welles, "Two Roosevelt Decisions: One Debit, One Credit'', Foreign Affairs, January 1951, No. 2, p. 193.
~^^3^^ Correspondence..., Volume One, p. 34.
~^^4^^ History of the Second World War. Vol. 3. Grand Strategy. By J. M. A. Gwyer and J. R. M. Butler. Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London, 1964, p. 105.
118 Profound in its conception and realisation, sweeping in scope and far-reaching in its military and political consequences, the battle on the Volga is a glorious page not only in the annals of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany, but also in the history of the world. In a speech marking the opening of the memorial complex in Volgograd on October 15, 1967 Leonid Brezhnev said: "The crack Nazi troops were not only milled in this battle. The Nazi drive for the offensive petered out here and their morale was broken. The fascist bloc began disintegrating.... The strength of those who would not bend their heads to the Nazis redoubled. `Stalingrad' became the watchword of resistance, the watchword of victory.''^^1^^The Battle of Stalingrad continued for six and a half months (from July 17, 1942, until February 2, 1943). The combat operations took up an area of about 100,000 square km, with the frontline varying at different times from 400 km to 850 km. Taking part in the fighting on both sides were more than two million men, over 2,000 tanks, and over 2,500 aircraft, about 26,000 guns and mortars.^^2^^ The enemy, who had sought to cut off the Volga as a line of supply and troop movement and capture the Caucasus, suffered a crushing defeat.
In the course of the defensive operation, in the area between the Don and the Volga, and also in Stalingrad itself, the Wehrmacht forces were worn out and then routed in a brilliant encirclement operation, with the Soviet and German sides being of approximately equal strength. After demolishing the 330,000-strong Nazi army at Stalingrad, the Soviet army launched an offensive in several sectors of the front. The Battle of Stalingrad fully revealed the heroism and supreme courage of the Soviet soldiers, the military skill and organisational talents of the Soviet army command. "Stalingrad spelled the decline _-_-_
~^^1^^ L. I. Brezhnev, Following Lenin's Course. Speeches and Articles, Vol. 2, Moscow, 1970, p. 68 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 6, 1976, pp. 3.5, 45.
119 for the Nazi army. After the Stalingrad holocaust, as is known, the Germans could never recover,''^^1^^ read the Government Report on the 26th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution.The Battle of Stalingrad was of tremendous international and military significance. It was a historic landmark on the Soviet Union's road to victory over Nazi Germany, the decisive strategic factor behind the sweeping changes in the political and strategic situation in favour of the anti-Hitler coalition.
A high evaluation of the victory of the Soviet troops in the Battle of Stalingrad was given by President Roosevelt in an honorary scroll to the city of Stalingrad. It reads: "In the name of the people of the United States of America, I present this scroll to the City of Stalingrad to commemorate our admiration for its gallant defenders whose courage, fortitude, and devotion during the siege of September 13, 1942 to January 31, 1943 will inspire forever the hearts of all free people. Their glorious victory stemmed the tide of invasion and marked the turning point in the war of the Allied Nations against the forces of aggression.''
A detailed examination of the Battle of Stalingrad was given in two chapters of Earl Ziemke's book Stalingrad to Berlin. This historian on the Pentagon staff puts his own evaluation on this battle. "Possessing some strategic attributes in its own right, Stalingrad became, in part by accident in part by design, the focal point of one of the decisive battles of World War II,"^^2^^ he writes.
Ziemke takes great pains to belittle the role of the Soviet army and Soviet military art in the battle on the Volga. He says bluntly that the victory at Stalingrad "resulted more from Hitler's errors than from Soviet military skill".^^3^^ At the same time he bends some heavily _-_-_
^^1^^ J. Stalin, On the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union. Moscow, 1947, p. 113 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Earl F. Ziemke, Stalingrad to Berlin: The German Defeat in the East. Office of the Chief of Military History, U.S. Anny, Washington, 1968, p. 37.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 80.
120 doctored facts trying to prove that the Soviet troops had numerical superiority at the time of the counter-offensive. According to Ziemke, the one million-strong Soviet army was confronted by half this number of Germans and their allies on the battlefield.^^1^^ However, this is nothing but an attempt to use official Western statistics drawn from the fabrications of Kurt Zeitzler and other Nazi generals which have long since been exposed as false in the Soviet and world literature on the military history of those days. It is well known that the total correlation of forces at Stalingrad was roughly equal: 1,015,300 troops on the Soviet side and 1,011,500 on the Nazi side.^^2^^ As for the main directions of attack, the Soviet command succeeded in gaining superiority over the enemy by skilfully manoeuvring its manpower and materiel.In the Western literature on the subject the Battle of Stalingrad is often compared with other battles in world military history. The most frequent comparison is that with the battle of Verdun. Cornelius Ryan, for example, believes that "the epic battle of Stalingrad was Germany's World War II Verdun".^^3^^ Significant in this respect is the line of reasoning taken by the British historian B. Pitt. "Stalingrad has been compared to Verdun in intensity and significance-and there is much to support the comparison; but in one vital matter it was different. The French in 1917 accepted Falkenhayn's challenge and exchanged soldier's life for soldier's life, feeding an endless stream of reinforcements into that cramped arena on the Meusse until both sides fell back sickened by the slaughter and bled almost white....
``At Stalingrad during that crucial winter of 1942--1943, the Red Army leaders showed an appreciation of military reality and ability to learn from the past which should act as a model for all.... They reinforced the defenders _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., p. 52.
~^^2^^ The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union 1941--1945. An Outline History, Moscow, 1970, p. 214 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ William Craig, Enemy at the Gates. The Rattle for Stalingrad. Hodder and S tough ton, London, 1973.
121 inside along lines dictated by the minimum necessary instead of the maximum possible and used the power and strength thus preserved to launch the great encirclement which eventually throttled Paulus's 6th Army.``Thus Stalingrad is the name of a great victory, won at reasonable cost; Verdun is just the name of a battle which devoured lives with the appetite of Moloch, and left both sides weaker and poorer.''^^1^^
Many military historians in the United States use the term "The Stalingrad in the West" which they apply to the encirclement of the 7th and 5th Panzer armies (about 20 divisions) between Falaise and Martin in August 1944.^^2^^ True, the fighting there was heavy. The Western Allies penetrated deep into the German positions, forcing the bleeding enemy to retreat beyond the Seine. However, the combined Allied force (about 37 divisions), which besides had clear superiority in the air, encircled, what was only the disjointed units of eight infantry and two armoured divisions totalling about 45,000 men. The Nazis succeeded in taking the most battleworthy armoured and infantry divisions out of the Falaise Gap. This partially successful encirclement plan had some weak points (as, for instance, not enough forces were detailed for creating the outer and inner fronts of encirclement) which were aggravated by disarray in the joint U.S.-British command and its indecision in the final stages of tht operation, as well as other circumstances.
American history books give prominence to the idea that Germany's fate was settled by "Stalingrad in the East and Bastogne, in the West"^^3^^. This comparison does not stand up to criticism. In Bastogne the German troops encircled the 101st airborne division and a part of the 10th armoured division of the U.S. armed forces. A week later the Nazi ring around these forces was broken. This event in the Ardennes which raised great concern in the _-_-_
~^^1^^ History of the Second World War. London, l9Q&%ol. Ill, Number 1.5.
~^^2^^ E. Florentin, The Battle of Falaise Gap. Hawtndfti Books, New York, 1967; The Army, January 1968, p. 76.
~^^3^^ Military Affairs, Vol. XXXIII, No. 3, December 1969, p. 416.
122 U.S. Army command occurred in the concluding stages of the Second World War when the defeat of Nazi Germany was only a few months away.Now for the Western attempts to ``explain'' the rout of the Nazi armies at Stalingrad by talk about Hitler's "fatal decisions''. By putting the blame for the defeat squarely on Hitler the authors of these books not only virtually absolve the Nazi General Staff, but also manage to get the idea across that Germany's defeat was somehow accidental, and that military revanche was still possible.
Here are two examples. The earlier mentioned American military historian Trevor Dupuy writes: "Hitler insisted that they [German generals] must not retreat one step from Stalingrad. While the German generals tried to persuade him to change his orders, the Russians brought in tremendous ground and air reinforcements....''^^1^^ Another American historian, Matthew Gallagher, known for his anti-Soviet sentiment, contends that "the German generals were aware of the threat to their flanks ... but Hitler, fearing the consequences to his prestige, refused to permit withdrawal".^^2^^
It is hard to believe that these and other historians sharing their views are not familiar with the article ``Stalingrad'' written by former Chief of the General Staff of the Nazi land forces, Colonel General Kurt Zeitzler, at the request of the U. S. Defense Department. In this article, which together with others formed a book entitled The Fatal Decisions, Zeitzler says that Hitler wanted to seize Stalingrad at all costs, and later ordered to keep under German control the part of the city which had already been occupied. He also says that Keitel and Jodl supported this plan.^^3^^
The book Enemy at the Gates by the American historian _-_-_
~^^1^^ Trevor N. Dupuy, The Military History of World War II. Vol. VII, Franklin Watts, 1962-6,5, p. ,5.
~^^2^^ Matthew P. Gallagher, The Soviet History of World War II: Myths, Memories and Realities. Frederick A. Praeger, Publisher, New York-London, 1963, p. 16.
~^^3^^ Colonel General Kurt Zeitzler, ``Stalingrad'', in: The Fatal Decisions. pp. 163--164.
123 William Craig merits a closer examination as a fundamental study of the Battle of Stalingrad.^^1^^ It largely reflects the views prevalent in the United States on the events on the Soviet-German front, and its author poses as an impartial and dispassionate interpreter of history.He avoids a repetition of the odious attempts to lump together the battle of Stalingrad with the battles for El Alamein or Tarawa Atoll in the Pacific, as is done by Hanson Baldwin and some other Western historians. At the same time he does not give the Battle of Stalingrad the place it deserves in the Second World War.
On closer examination the reader can see that Craig gives very perfunctory treatment to the military operations at Stalingrad, has confused different episodes of the battle, and ranks and names of military commanders. According to him, the Kazakhs live on the Volga, and Novosibirsk is a city in the Urals,^^2^^ etc. The author does not go to the trouble of examining the rich historical material he uses in his book. He obviously had other intentions and another mission to fulfill.
The defeat of the Nazi armies at Stalingrad and the successes of the Soviet armies are, according to Craig, the result of Hitler's mistakes. In his review of the Battle of Stalingrad he tries to convince his readers that Voronezh remained in Soviet hands solely because of the Fiihrer's oversight. "Originally Hitler planned to bypass Voronezh.... But when German armor easily [sic] penetrated the outskirts and commanders radioed for permission to seize the rest of the city, Hitler vacillated, leaving the decision to Army Group B's commander, Field Marshal Fedor von Bock.''^^3^^
The fierce fighting at Voronezh in the summer of 1942 tells a different story. It was the heroic resistance of the Soviet army units and formations, and the timely and masterly operations carried out by the Soviet military _-_-_
^^1^^ William C raig, Enemy at the Gates. The Battle for Stalingrad. Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1973.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 321, 387.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 18.
124 command that frustrated the Nazi plans to capture Voronezh. The mobile formations of the German army which, on July 6, succeeded in capturing a vantage ground on the left bank of the Don and in capturing a part of the city, came up against the well-organised and stubborn resistance of the Soviet troops. On that same day the Bryansk Front delivered a counter-strike south of Yelets, as the result of which the fascist command was forced to turn north the 24th Panzer corps and three infantry divisions which had been moving into the Voronezh area. The Nazi striking force which was supposed to capture Voronezh thus lost much of its strength and failed to accomplish its mission.^^1^^Craig insists that the Paulus group could have been saved, had it not been for the arbitrary orders of Hitler who had forbidden the encircled German troops to break through towards the advancing forces of Field Marshal Manstein.^^2^^ In his words, the offensive of the Don Front, which was to relieve the encircled troops, proceeded as planned: "Surprisingly, the Russian resistance was negligible.... The worst problem facing the Germans was the ice that covered the roads and prevented the Panzers from getting ample traction.''^^3^^
The actual picture of the offensive which the Nazis launched on December 12, 1942, from Kotelnikovo to Stalingrad was quite different. The enemy, with all his superior strength, sustained tremendous losses at the hands of the Soviet soldiers -who offered dogged resistance and fought to the death. Field Marshal Manstein writes in his memoirs about the beginning of the offensive of the Don Front under his command: "The enemy went far beyond the defensive action, launching counter-attacks in order to either regain the area captured by our two Panzer divisions or encircle some of their units.''^^4^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 5, 1975, pp. 148--154.
~^^2^^ William Craig, Enemy at the Gates, pp. 250, 272, et al.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 231.
~^^4^^ Erich von Manstein, Verlorene Siege, Athenaum-Verlag, Bonn, 1955.
125In Craig's opinion, the most important contributing factor behind the victory of the Soviet Army at Stalingrad was the leak of top secret information from the German command. He refers to the activity of Sandor RadO, Rudolf Rossler, and other anti-fascists doing intelligence work against the Nazis.^^1^^
But such a version of events, propounded not only by Craig, but by many other Western historians, was refuted by Sandor Rad6 himself: "As an intelligence man, I would be the last person to deny the importance of intelligence work of those who collected the precious information in the enemy rear. But to credit our victory to intelligence work would be turning the whole thing upside down. Such attempts of the bourgeois falsifiers are ridiculous, to say the least.... The outcome of the war was in the final analysis decided on the battlefield. Victory favoured the army which had greater economic potential and manpower resources, was better armed and trained, and had superior moral strength.''^^2^^
Much space in Craig's book is taken up by the "moral aspects of the war in the East''. He divides the facts into those that could be and those that could not be used for anti-Soviet propaganda. He selects for his narrative all the facts in the first group and discards all the rest, as can be judged from his lengthy descriptions of the life of Nazi soldiers, officers and generals taken prisoner at Stalingrad.
The Morning Star, the newspaper of the British Communists, wrote in this connection: "But one is left wondering how reliable can be the latter-day evidence of some of William Craig's [West] German interviewees, a surprising number of whom seem to recall only the more humane of their own or their comrades' deeds and only the harshness of their captors.''^^3^^
It would be well to recall here that the victory at _-_-_
~^^1^^ William Craig, Enemy at the Gates, pp. 23, 24.
~^^2^^ Rado Sandor, Dora Jelenti... Kossuth Konyvkiado, Budapest, 1971, p. 327.
~^^3^^ Morning Star, November 1, 1973.
126 Stalingrad was achieved in a.situation which was very difficult for the Soviet Union, which was being threatened by the handpicked Kwantung Army in the Far East and by a large contingent of Turkish troops in the south poised as they were for attack. Between the two of them, Japan and Turkey tied up a considerable portion of the Soviet armed forces, thereby limiting their possibilities in the struggle against the Nazi invaders, which was growing in scope and ferocity.The breach by the leaders of the United States and Britain of the Allied commitment to open a second front in 1942 exacerbated the already difficult situation in the Soviet Union. This enabled Germany to funnel its forces and material resources to the Soviet-German front, not only to make good its losses, but to actually increase the number of troops operating against Soviet armies.
And yet, many Western authors still try to make it seem that the Soviet Army would not have been able to win without Anglo-American military support.
Ronald Seth, a contributor to Der Zweite Weltkrieg, writes, for example, that the shortage of manpower reserve which prevented the German command from achieving its objectives in the East in 1942 came from the inability to use vast armies tied up in the West against the possibility of Anglo-American troops landing.^^1^^ The American historian James Stokesbury insists that the Russians specially put off their counter-offensive at Stalingrad until November 1942 waiting for "the Allied invasion of French North Africa, rightly seen as tying down the German reserves in Western Europe".^^2^^ Craig, for his part, tries to attribute a still greater role to the imminent Anglo-American invasion of France. He writes that at the time when the Battle of Stalingrad was already in progress, the German command transferred the _-_-_
^^1^^ Der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 2, Verlag Das Beste, Stuttgart, 1979, S. 285.
^^2^^ James L. Stokesbury, A Short History of World War II. William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York, 1980, p. 239.
127 Grossdeutschland Panzer Division from the Soviet-German front to France.^^1^^The arguments used by Seth, Stokesbury and Craig have failed to find their confirmation in fact. In the first place, shortly before the start of the Battle of Stalingrad the Nazis had a total of 530,000 troops in Western Europe, as against 2,997,000 on the SovietGerman front, the ratio being one to six. In the West the Germans had one air fleet and in the East four air fleets.^^2^^ In addition to that, a considerable part of the German forces in the West were made up of battle-weary formations, or what was left of them, which had been moved over there from the Soviet-German front for rest and reactivation.
Second, in the days and months of the Battle of Stalingrad the Nazis were busy shifting more troops to the Eastern front, primarily from the West. In the period between November 1942 and April 1943, the Hitler command moved 35 new divisions from France and other countries of Western Europe to make good the heavy losses on the Soviet-German front.^^3^^ Craig's contention that the Nazi military command moved the Grossdeutschland Division over to the West was a lie out of the whole cloth. The Haider diary confirms that this division was operating on the Soviet-German front.^^4^^ The Grossdeutschland Division was brought to the Soviet-German front in May 1942 and stayed there to the end of the war.^^5^^
With the beginning of the counter-offensive at Stalingrad in November 1942,. which developed into an all-out offensive that lasted through the better part of March 1943, more than 100 enemy divisions were put to rout. Altogether, the Nazis lost about 1,700,000 officers and _-_-_
~^^1^^ William Craig, Enemy at the Gates, p. 20.
^^2^^ G. Forster, und anderen, Der Zweite Weltkrieg, VEB Verlag, Leipzig, 1962, S. 196--197.
^^3^^ A History of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union T 941--1945- Vol. 6, Moscow, 1965, p. 30 (in Russian).
~^^4^^ Generaloberst Haider, Kriegstagebuch. Band III, 1964, S. 528--529.
~^^5^^ B. Miiller-Hillebrand, Das Heer 1933--1945. Mittler, Frankfurt am Main, 1969, S. 405.
128
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The soldiers of the Polish Army fighting for Warsaw. September 1944
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A mass meeting in Bucharest after the liberation of the city by Soviet
1/2~7---682
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A mass meeting in liberated Belgrade. October 1944
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A political agitation group of the Vietnam liberation army. 1944
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The troops of the First Czechoslovak Army Corps back on native soil.
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Indian troops attacking Japanese positions in Burma. 1944
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The Allied troops landing in Normandy. June 1941
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American artillery-men in the Ardennes sector of the Western front.
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Soviet self-propelled guns poised for the attack on Berlin. April 1945
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Soviet and American troops meeting on the Elbe. April 1945
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The Banner of Victory hoisted over Berlin. May 1945
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Berlin. Soviet troops at the Branclenburger Tor. May 1945
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Prague salutes its liberators. 1945
men (killed, wounded, missing in action, taken
prisoner), 24,000 guns, more than 3,500 tanks and 4,300
aircraft.^^1^^ These losses greatly undermined the military
strength of Nazi Germany. The Battle of Stalingrad was
a major contribution to the turning of the tide in the
Great Patriotic War and indeed in the whole of the
Second World War.
At midnight, August 5, 1943, Moscow gave an artillery salute in honour of the heroes of Orel and Belgorod for their outstanding victory in the Battle of Kursk. That was the first victory salute fired since the start of the war. Twelve salvoes from 124 guns announced to the Soviet people and the world that Nazi Germany had suffered yet another shattering defeat, which pushed her to the brink of disaster.
The Battle of Kursk (July 5-August 23, 1943) involved huge forces and materiel on both sides: more than four million troops, more than 69,000 guns and mortars, more than 13,000 tanks and self-propelled guns, and about 12,000 aircraft.^^2^^ After the defeat at Stalingrad, that was the. last attempt on the part of the Nazi command to mount a major offensive on the Soviet-German front in order to gain strategic initiative and reverse the course of events in its favour.
The Soviet Supreme Command, knowing from intelligence reports that the enemy was preparing an offensive, decided on deliberate defence. In the series of battles that ensued, the powerful enemy groups concentrated in this sector of the front were exhausted, and subsequently rolled back in a sweeping counter-attack. The Battle of Kursk, which was also known as the biggest battle of tanks in the Second World War, cost the Wehrmacht 30 crack divisions, including seven Panzer divisions. The Nazis lost more than 500,000 officers and men, 1,500 _-_-_
~^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 6, 1976, p. 467.
^^2^^ The Soviet Military Encyclopaedia. Vol. 4, Moscow, 1977, pp. 536-- 539 (in Russian).
__PRINTERS_P_129_COMMENT__ 8-682 129 tanks, 3,700 aircraft and 3,000 artillery pieces.^^1^^ The advancing Soviet army liberated Orel, Kharkov, and many other towns and villages, thus creating favourable conditions for the liberation of the part of the Ukraine east of the River Dnieper.Hardly any major works about this battle were written in the West before the sixties. Though in wartime its great significance was recognised in the Western literature. "The great Soviet offensive which started rolling on the Kursk-Orel front in the summer of 1943, did not stop until the following spring when the Nazi invaders were driven completely out of southern Russia,'' reads A Brief History of World War II.^^2^^
Since then bourgeois authors have been taking great pains to keep silent about or belittle the victories of the Soviet army at Kursk and its effect on the outcome of the Second World War as a whole.
One of their favourite versions is about the so-called limited objectives of the offensive undertaken by the fascist Wehrmacht in the Kursk Salient (Operation Citadel). The section in Earl Ziemke's book about this operation is called "A Limited Offensive".^^3^^ The same evaluation of the objectives of the German offensive was given by Trevor Dupuy and many other American historians.^^4^^ A similar point of view has gained ground in most publications of the West German historians. Ernst Klink believes that in planning Operation Citadel the Hitler strategists sought not to regain their strategic initiative but to strengthen their own defences.^^5^^ Since these aims were limited, they continue, the failure of the offensive cannot be regarded as a factor of strategic importance.
But this conclusion is at variance with the facts. The _-_-_
~^^1^^ The Soviet Military Encyclopaedia. Vol. 4, 1977, p. 539.
~^^2^^ The World at War 7939--1944. A Brief History of World War II. Washington, The Infantry Journal, 1945, p. 244.
~^^3^^ Earl F. Ziemke, Stalingrad to Berlin, p. 124.
~^^4^^ Trevor N. Dupuy, The Military Life of Adolf Hitler. Franklin Watts, Inc., New York, 1969, p. 116.
~^^5^^ Ernst Klink, Das Gesetz des Handelns. Die Operation ``Zitadelle'' 1943. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1966, S. 11.
130 preparations for Operation Citadel, and the forces concentrated for its realisation go to show that by launching an offensive at Kursk the Nazis hoped to achieve farreaching goals. This, in effect, was their desperate attempt to defeat the main forces of the Soviet army, to regain their strategic initiative, to preserve the fascist bloc of countries and turn the tide of the war in their favour.Operation Order No. 6 of the Wehrmacht High Command (signed by Hitler) on preparations for an all-out offensive at Kursk reads: "Every commander, every rank-and-file soldier must grasp the full importance of this offensive. Our victory at Kursk must serve as a torch for the whole world.''^^1^^ In this order the German High Command demanded that the best formations, the best armaments, the best commanders and the largest service of supply and ammunition be used in the offensive in the Kursk Salient. The former chief of staff of the 48th Panzer Corps of the Wehrmacht, F.W. von Mellenthin writes that "no attack could have been better prepared than this one".^^2^^
The Nazi command concentrated immediately outside Kursk 50 crack divisions, including 14 Panzer divisions (about 70 per cent of the armour on the Soviet-German front), and two motorised divisions. Altogether the German forces there included more than 900,000 men, about 10,000 guns and mortars, 2,700 tanks and self-propelled guns and more than 2,000 aircraft.^^3^^ The Nazi leaders dispatched to Kursk almost all the Panther and Tiger tanks and the heavily plated Ferdinand self-propelled guns manufactured in Germany by the beginning of July 1943. This large concentration of force could not possibly have been made for "a limited offensive''. On the contrary, the Hitler command had mounted a far-flung strategic operation which, however, was frustrated by the masterly and heroic actions of the Soviet army.
_-_-_^^1^^ Quoted from: The Battle of Kursk, Moscow, 1970, p. 520 (in Russian).
^^2^^ F. W. von Mellenthin, I'anzer Battles 1939--1945. Cassell & Co., Ltd., London, 1955, p. 215.
^^3^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945, Vol. 7, 1976, p. 144.
131An insidious method of falsifying the history of the Battle of Kursk is the assertion that it was the AngloAmerican landing in Sicily, and not the victory of the Soviet Army, that forced the Hitler command to halt Operation Citadel.
This is what ``official'' historians in the United States write in The Encyclopedia Americana. They admit that "the situation north of Orel was precarious'', but then try to convince the reader that Hitler's "greatest source of worry was Sicily, where American and British troops had landed on July 10''.^^1^^
The Allied landing in Sicily worsened Germany's strategic positions, but could not have markedly affected the course of the fighting near Kursk. On July 10, Hitler gave the go-ahead for the operation. The next day the Nazi troops made fresh efforts to achieve a breakthrough at Kursk. They changed the direction of their main strikes and committed new Panzer formations, but with no success. On July 12, the forces of the Western and the Bryansk Fronts launched an offensive in the Orel sector, and the Voronezh Front launched a counter-attack near the village of Prokhorovka and against the left flank of the Nazi strike force which tried to break through to Kursk from the south.
This radically changed the situation in the Kursk-Orel Salient, putting the Germans in a critical position. Under the mighty blows of the Soviet forces, Army Group Centre abandoned its earlier plans for offensive operations and assumed the defensive. On July 13 Hitler summoned the conference. The critical position of the German troops in the Salient compelled Hitler to go over to defensive, but he was dissuaded by Field Marshal Manstein, commander of Army Group South. Army Group Centre was allowed to assume the defensive, while Manstein was to continue the offensive. As for the final decision to halt Operation Citadel and to assume the defensive along the entire frontline between Kharkov and Orel, it was adopted by _-_-_
^^1^^ The Encyclopedia Americana. Vol. 29, 1968, p. 433.
132 the Wehrmacht High Command only on July 19, 1948, when the Orel group of Nazi armies faced the danger of encirclement.^^1^^In spite of the Allied troop landing in Sicily, the Soviet-German front continued to tie up and demolish the main forces of the Nazi war machine. Suffice it to say that more than 70 per cent of the German field forces was in the East, which enabled the Allies to effect a comparatively easy landing in Sicily. What is more, the Soviet army offensive foiled the Nazi plan to move some of the German divisions over to Italy.
Some Western historians hold that the Soviet victory in the Battle of Kursk was the result of "accidental circumstances''. Thomas Weyr says, for example, that the Nazi plan of an offensive towards Kursk "was a good one and, had Hitler carried it out as soon as the spring thaws were over, might well have succeeded".^^2^^ According to some other American historians, the German operation was hampered by a violent rain storm on July 5 which made the entire terrain on the southern side of the Kursk Salient completely impassable for the tanks, and the poor weather on July 8 prevented the use of the aircraft.^^3^^
Earlier on we mentioned some of the inept references to the weather as the reason for the Nazi military reverses. The actual reason is different; the defeat of the Nazis at Stalingrad, which shook their entire war machine, removed all possibility of the German troops' launching an all-out offensive in the Kursk Salient in the spring of 1943. After the encirclement of the Paulus group had been completed, the Soviet command moved to the Kursk area large army contingents from the Volga.
But bourgeois historians are powerless to hush up the irrefutable fact that the Nazi troops used a number of _-_-_
^^1^^ See: G. A. Koltunov, B. G. Solovyov, The Battle of Kursk, Moscow, 1970, p. 228 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Thomas Weyr, World War II. Bailey Bros & Swinfen Ltd., Folkestone, 1970, p. 12(>.
~^^3^^ Earl F. /iemke, Stalingrad to Berlin, pp. 135-KUi.
133 rigid patterns for planning their operations and carrying them out, whereas the Soviet command kept looking for new, original solutions. One of these was their decision to deliberately assume the defensive in a situation in which the Soviet armed forces had overwhelming superiority over the enemy.Martin Caidin, who is more objective than others in his assessment of the Battle of Kursk, singles out two principal factors which, in his view, were behind the Soviet victory: first, a brilliantly executed plan of deliberately going over to the defensive, followed by a counter-attack; and second, the fighting ability and stamina of Soviet soldiers.^^1^^ He argues with those who keep silent about the special place this battle held in the war, and calls it "the greatest single land-and-air combat engagement in military history".^^2^^ Martin Caidin sets at length the arguments of the Soviet historians who expose the Western falsifiers of history, and comes to the conclusion that their arguments have "points of validity ... especially in ... reference to histories that purport to cover the entire Second World War'', that "...much of the story on the Russian front failed to reach the writers, the editors, and the publishers who were responsible for historical volumes''. Examining the episodes of the Battle of Kursk he writes: "The divisions on the eastern front in July 1943, then represented .approximately 75 percent of the total strength of the German army, which le,nds hard credence to the insistence of the Russians that they were carrying the brunt of th^ Jand war against the common enemy.''^^3^^
Caidin has studied the plans of the Wehrmacht's offensive in the Orel-Kursk section of the front and the plans of the campaign in the summer of 1943, and comes to the conclusion that the Nazi strategists were out to achieve wide-ranging objectives. Operation Citadel was _-_-_
~^^1^^ Martin Caidin, The Tigers Are Burning. Hawthorn Books, Inc., New York, 1974.
~^^2^^ Ibid., book cover.
~^^3^^ Ibid., pp. 47, 87 W.
134 to be followed by a new sweeping offensive on Moscow. If they achieved all these goals on the Eastern front, the Nazis then planned to occupy Sweden and then move their troops against the Anglo-American forces, should they attempt to invade Italy. With all this in mind Caidin concludes that "it was not only the tide of the Russian fortunes that would be decided at Kursk. It was the war itself'.^^1^^This American author provides some interesting figures on the Soviet and German forces fielded at the time the Nazis began their offensive. In his view the two sides were approximately equal in the number of tanks and aircraft. The Hitler armies had 3,200 tanks and assault guns and 2,500 aircraft. This means, he continues, that "the Wehrmacht had been badly mauled in two years of fighting with the Russians, but there remained a tremendous cutting edge of German steel for the offensive against the Kursk salient.... Hitler had come to believe, along with many of his generals, that the German army stood an excellent chance of achieving its main objective at Kursk-to cut off the Russian forces in the salient...".^^2^^
Caidin gives much credit for the victory at Kursk to Soviet military thinking which made it possible to see through the enemy designs and to work out an effective plan of action in the 1943 summer campaign. He specifically mentions Marshal Zhukov, Marshal Rokossovsky and General of the Army Vatutin. "We too have our ranks of military greats. General George Patton springs to mind. There is Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery and General Douglas MacArthur.... How many students, to whom World War II is now musty history, recognize at once the name of Georgi Zhukov? ... the man .. who will stand above all others as the master of the art of mass warfare in the twentieth centurv.''^^3^^ Analysing the progress reports of the Front Commanders-Rokossovsky and _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., P. 8.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 85, 89.
~^^3^^ Ibid., pp. 97, 98.
135 Vatutin-about a possible course of action by the enemy, Caidin writes that "both Rokossovsky and Vatutin had formulated a brilliant assessment of the capabilities of the enemy facing them''.^^1^^Notable in the sense of historical authenticity and in the light of numerous fabrications of Western Sovietologists about the so-called "technical backwardness" of the USSR are the high evaluations that the author of the Tigers Are Burning puts on Soviet weapons: the T-34 and KV-1 tanks, IL-2 fighter-bomber, 76 mm gun, etc. He refers to the T-34 tank as "the finest tank in the world.... It owed its existence to men who could envisage a mid-century battlefield more clearly than anyone in the West."^^2^^
The course of the Kursk battle itself and the subsequent offensive of the Soviet army are given much less space in Caidin's book. He writes that, in spite of the massive use of some new and unexpected methods of warfare the Nazi troops failed to achieve a strategic success and got bogged down in the mighty system of Soviet defences.
He points out the successes scored by Soviet tanks and air force, the effectiveness of the massive attacks carried out by IL-2 fighter-bombers. He attaches special significance to the artillery strike at the Nazi troops poised for attack and says that as a result of that strike the German infantry was cut off from the tanks and the tanks themselves were caught in devastating crossfire, and that effective methods of fighting were found to deal with the Tigers and Ferdinands. Caidin made numerous references to the heroism of the Soviet soldiers and their combat skill.
The book is not, however, free from certain defects and bears some typical marks of Western writing about the Second World War. Caidin, too, repeats the old story about Hitler's sole and personal responsibility for the debacle in the Kursk Salient. He follows in the footsteps of other bourgeois historians claiming that there could have been another outcome of the Battle of Kursk: "There is every chance that _-_-_
^^1^^ Martin Caidin. Op. cit., p. 107
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 149.
136 the battle of Kursk might well have produced different results without the sudden artillery attack.''^^1^^ Linking the outcome of the battle to certain accidental factors he concludes that the Wehrmacht lost this battle because its Tigers had no machine guns.^^2^^Summing up the results of the Battle of Kursk, Caidin describes it as "a debacle, a disaster of unspeakable proportion" and writes that the Soviet offensive broke the back of more than a hundred Nazi divisions. Clearly ip disagreement with Hitler's generals who survived the war and are still denying this fact, he says with a touch of sarcasm: "They will describe the brilliant reargard actions of their troops, but they find it difficult to admit that this was brilliance in defeat and not in victory.... The important end result of Kursk is this: When the last shots had echoed off into the hills, it was the Russian army that had gathered to itself the impetus of the war, and it was the Russian army that dictated when and where that war would be fought.''^^3^^
The strategic triangle-Moscow-Stalingrad-- Kurskreversed the course of the fighting on the Soviet-German front and that of the Second World War as a whole.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ THE LIBERATION MISSIONThe tasks and goals of the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War were defined in a directive of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) issued on June 29, 1941,^^4^^ and in a radio address by Stalin, which contained its main provisions, on July 3, 1941.
``The war with Nazi Germany is no ordinary war. This is not only a war between two armies. This is also a great war of the entire Soviet nation against the Nazi troops. The aim of this truly people's Patriotic War against the fascist _-_-_
^^1^^ Ibid., p. 172.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 22.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 26.
~^^4^^ The CPSU on the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union. Documents, 1917-- 1981. Moscow, 1981, p. 297 (in Russian).
137 oppressors is not only to eliminate the danger threatening our country, but also to help all the peoples of Europe languishing under the yoke of German fascism.''^^1^^The aims of the war determined the principal objectives of Soviet foreign policy: to set up a powerful coalition of states and peoples for the struggle against fascist aggression. The struggle of the USSR for the formation and consolidation of such a coalition was the continuation, in new historical conditions, of its consistent policy aimed at repelling the aggressor by collective effort, at carrying out its internationalist duty to the freedom-loving nations which our country had pursued before the war. Of great importance for the accomplishment of this goal was the Soviet-British Treaty of Alliance signed in London on May 26, 1942, and the Soviet-American agreement on the principles of mutual assistance in the conduct of war against aggression^^2^^ signed in Washington on June 12, 1942. These documents served as the legal basis for the wartime coalition of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain.
The heroic struggle of the Soviet people, who took the brunt of the fighting against the fascist bloc, and the just liberatory goals of the Soviet Union in the war put the USSR in the vanguard of the anti-Hitler coalition.^^3^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Joseph Stalin, On the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, Moscow, 1947, p. 16.
~^^2^^ The Foreign Policy of the Soviet Union During the Patriotic War. Vol. 1, Moscow, 1946,.pp. 270--273, 277--283 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ The main decisions on the conduct of the war and on the postwar settlement were made at the top level conferences of the USSR, the United States, and Britain-in Teheran (1943), Yalta (1945), and in Potsdam (1945)-within the framework of the anti-Hitler coalition. As the war drew to a close the anti-Hitler coalition had grown to more that 50 nations (with the USSR, the USA, China, Britain and France as its nucleus). Taking part in the fighting against Germany and her allies were Albania, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Czechoslovakia, India, Mexico, New Zealand, Poland, Yugoslavia, and others. __NOTE__ Footnote cont. on page 139. 138
``If the Soviet Union had failed to hold on its front, the Germans would have been in a position to conquer Great Britain. They would have been able to overrun Africa, too, and in this event they could have established a foothold in Latin America. This impending danger was constantly in President Roosevelt's mind,'' wrote U.S. Secretary of State Edward R. Stettinius.^^1^^
A natural ally of the anti-Hitler coalition was the popular resistance movement against the German, Italian, and Japanese invaders, which was particularly strong in Yugoslavia, Albania, Greece, Poland, France, Czechoslovakia, Vietnam, China, Burma, Indonesia and the Philippines. An important contribution to the struggle against the fascist regimes in their own countries were the anti-fascist organisations in Italy, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and in Germany itself.
Under the leadership of the Communists and some other left-wing forces, the patriots of the Nazi-occupied countries set up underground organisations and put up stiff resistance to the fascists. Examples of this were the uprisings in Paris, in northern Italy, the liberation of many towns in France, Italy and other countries from the fascist regimes even before the arrival of the Allied troops.
Throughout the entire period of the Second World War the Soviet Union offered all-round assistance, including military aid, to the forces fighting against the fascists in the occupied countries.
The year 1944 opened with the offensive of the Leningrad and Volkhov Fronts which brought to a successful conclusion the epic battle for Leningrad which had been going on for more than two and a half years. The defeat of the Nazi armies in the part of the Ukraine west of the River Dnieper _-_-_ __NOTE__ Footnote cont. from page 138. Some countries contributed to the common war effort with strategic raw materials and in other ways. The African and other colonial armed forces also made their contributions to the victory over the aggressor. The anti-Hitler coalition was formally joined by some countries (such as Turkey) which had declared war on Germany shortly before her defeat and which did little, if anything, towards the victory over the common enemy.
^^1^^ Edward R. Stettinius. Roosevelt and the Russians. The Yalta Conference. Jonathan Cape, London, 1950, p. Hi.
139 created a desperate situation for the fascist armed forces in the Crimea (seven Romanian and five German divisions--- a total of 195,000), which were put to rout in April and May that year.In the course of the winter and spring of 1944 the Soviet army advanced up to 450 km and smashed 172 enemy divisions.
In spite of the major successes of the Anglo-American forces in the Mediterranean, the European and the Pacific theatres of the war, the area of decisive action continued to be the Soviet-German front, where the Wehrmacht and its allies maintained the bulk of their forces, which can be judged from the following table.
The Number of Divisions That Germany and Its Allies Maintained in the War of 1941--1945 June `i'l 1!)41 April 1942 November 1942 April 1943 January 1944' June '1944 January 1(14.1 Soviet-German front 190 219 266 231 245 239.5 195.5 Other fronts 9 11 12.5 14.5 21 85 107The Soviet armed forces which mounted a giant offensive from the Barents Sea in the north to the Black Sea in the south over a front of 4,500 km, had 6.6 million troops, 98,100 guns and mortars, 7,100 tanks and self-propelled guns, about 12,900 aircraft.^^1^^ The Soviet armed forces also included some Polish, Czechoslovak, Romanian, Yugoslav units and formations and the French Normandie-Niemen air regiment.^^2^^ The Soviet army had firmly taken the strategic initiative into its own hands and was now inexorably closing in on the vital industrial and military centres of the enemy outside Soviet territory. As early as the end of March 1944, the 2nd Ukrainian Front under the command of Marshal Konev _-_-_
^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 9, 1978, pp. 17--19.
^^2^^ The Liberation Mission of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Second World War. Moscow, 1971, p. 80 (in Russian).
140 entered the territory of Romania. Early in June the Soviet army reached the frontiers of Poland and Czechoslovakia.The cleverly conceived and executed operations in 1944--1945 in Byelorussia, at Lvov and Sandomir, at Jassy and Kishinev, on the Vistula and the Oder, at PetsamoKirkenes, in Budapest, Belgrade, Prague, Berlin, and (after the USSR had entered the war against Japan) in Manchuria, cleared fully or in part the territory of Romania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Austria, Finland, Norway, Denmark. Germany, China and Korea.
In fighting the strong and treacherous enemy and fulfilling its liberation mission the Soviet Army lost more than three million men, including more than one million killed in action. Soviet soldiers considered it their internationalist duty to come to the aid of other nations and fulfilled in unhesitatingly though at the cost of heavy losses.
The peoples of the countries'which the Soviet army liberated from fascist oppression hailed the Soviet soldiers with gratitude and respect.
Here is an example:
On July 26, 1944, G.P.Kunavin, private first class of the 1021st Infantry Regiment, a CPSU member, fell in battle fighting outside the village of Gierasimowicze of the Bialystok region. When the company he was serving with began an offensive on Gierasimowicze, their progress was checked by machine-gun fire from a height that dominated the whole area. The attackers dropped flat. At that moment Kunavin lunged forward and flung himself upon the embrasure. The company was now able to continue the attack. The inhabitants of liberated Gierasimowicze gathered for a meeting on August 9, 1944, and decided on the following: "Grigory Pavlovich Kunavin came from the far-off Urals to liberate our country. His heart was pierced here by enemy bullets. But he cleared the road to victory for Red Army men as valiant as himself. He fought for our happiness, so that the enemy would never again set foot on the threshold of our house.
``We honour the name of the Russian soldier Grigory Kunavin as the banner of the great brotherhood of the Russian and the Polish peoples.... As a token of our gratitude 141 to the Russian brother-liberator, the people of Gierasimowicze, at this general meeting today, have decided:
``1. To enter the name of the Russian soldier, Grigory Pavlovich Kunavin, onto the scroll of the honorary citizens of the Polish village of Gierasimowicze for all time.
``2. To set up a marble slab with his name in the centre of the village.
``3. To request that the name of Grigory Kunavin be given to the school our children go to.
``4. To decree that every year the first lesson in the first form shall be about the hero-soldier and his comrades-- inarms who shed their blood to make Polish children free and happy....''^^1^^
The liberation mission of the Soviet armed forces has over the years been maligned by Western historians, who have brought forth a whole lot of stories about mythical Soviet expansionism, saying that the Soviet troops entered the territory of other countries against the will of their people. The West German historian, Hans-Adolf Jacobsen says bluntly that the Soviet army "started planting communist regimes under the slogan of `liberation' and at the point of its bayonets^^2^^''. The idea of these fabrications is to inflate the myth of the Soviet military threat and in this way to drive a wedge into the fraternal relations between the USSR and the other socialist countries.
Stories of this sort are clearly meant for an ill-informed reader and are insulting to the peoples of Yugoslavia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Norway and other countries who fought courageously against the Nazi invaders and know that in this struggle the Soviet Union was their steadfast ally.
In liberating foreign countries from occupation, the Soviet Union strictly abided by the existing treaties and _-_-_
^^1^^ Revue Internationale d'Histoire Militaire, No. 44, 1979, p. 187.
~^^2^^ Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Der Weg zur Teilung der Welt. Politik und Strategic 1939--1945. Verlag Wehr & Wissen, Koblenz-Bonn, 1977, S. 19.
142 agreements. For instance, the Soviet army entered Poland in accordance with an agreement reached with the Krajowa Rada Narodowa in the spring of 1944. Analogous agreements were signed with Czechoslovakia in December 1943, and with Norway in May 1944. The question of moving hostilities to the territory of Yugoslavia was agreed with the Supreme Command of the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia, etc.^^1^^ By sending its armed forces on a liberation mission to the countries of Europe and Asia, the USSR never interfered in their internal affairs and showed profound respect for the national traditions and customs of their peoples.The term "export of revolution" was coined by Churchill who was the first to suggest many years ago that there had been some deal between Britain and the Soviet Union, dividing up the Balkans into "spheres of influence''. Different versions of this story come up in the works and memoirs of many reactionary historians, such as Charles Bohlen and Charles L. Mee. References to these fabrications have also been made by Francis Loewenheim, Harold Langley, and Manfred Jonas in their commentaries on the secret correspondence between Roosevelt and Churchill.^^2^^ All these stories boil down to the thesis that when Churchill met Stalin in October 1944, the latter gave his consent to a division of the Balkans into "spheres of influence"^^3^^
Now, who is telling the truth, and who is lying?
First, a few words about the circumstances in which the Balkans story originated.
...In October 1944, the final defeat of Nazi Germany, gripped in the vice of two fronts, was only a few months away. The Soviet army was inexorably advancing upon the enemy, crushing its armies and liberating the peoples of Europe from fascist slavery. The Soviet troops were completing the _-_-_
^^1^^ World Marxist Review, May 1980, No. 5, p. 114.
~^^2^^ Roosevelt and Churchill. Their Secret Wartime Correspondence. Ed. by Francis L. Loewenheim, Harold D. Langley, Manfred Jonas, Saturday Review Press/E. P. Button & Co., Inc., New York, 1975, p. 584.
~^^3^^ Charles L. Mee, Meeting at Potsdam. Purnell Book Services, Limited, Thetford, 1975, p. 118; Charles Bohlen, Witness to History 1924--1969. Norton-New York, 1973, pp. 161--163.
143 liberation of Romania, had freed the eastern areas of Poland and had entered the territory of Bulgaria, Hungary, Norway, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia. Helped by the peoples of these countries the Soviet army continued its westward advance. The expulsion of the fascist invaders and the rising democratic movement in the liberated countries of Europe created a revolutionary situation there.That was when Churchill flew to Moscow. The Balkan strategy of the Western Allies was about to collapse, and with it the plans for dispatching the Anglo-American armies from Italy, through the Ljubljana Pass, to the Balkans and establishing, reactionary British- and American-oriented regimes in that area. This is what Lord Oliver Lyttelton, one of the Cabinet ministers, wrote about Churchill in his memoirs: "Time and again he drew attention to the advantages to be gained if the Western Allies rather than the Russians were the liberators and the occupying armies of some of the capitals, Budapest, Prague, Vienna, Warsaw, which are part of the very foundation of Europe.''^^1^^ A few years ago a memorandum was published. It was written by William Bullitt, a leading American diplomat, to President Roosevelt and dated August 10, 1943, which provides more evidence as to the existence of such plans. The memorandum reads: "Our political objectives require the establishment of British and American forces in the Balkans and eastern and central Europe. Their first objective should be the defeat of Germany, the second, the barring to the Red Army of the way into Europe.''^^2^^
Kent Greenfield believes that it was President Roosevelt who gave life to the Balkan variant of Western Allied strategy. In 1942, he says, Roosevelt "took the initiative in encouraging Mr. Churchill's brightest hopes for concentration in the Mediterranean, proposing that he have the Combined Chiefs explore the possibilities of forward movement directed against Sardinia, Sicily, Italy, Greece and other Balkan (please note, ``Balkan'') areas, and including the possibility __PARAGRAPH_PAUSE__ _-_-_
~^^1^^ The Memoirs of Lord Chandos Oliver Lyttelton. The Bodley Head, London, 1962, p. 178.
^^2^^ The New York Times, April 26, 1970, p. 30.
144
__CAPTION__
The victory salute in Moscow. May 9, 1945
'/49-682
__CAPTION__
The leaders of the anti-fascist coalition. From right lo left: Chairman
__CAPTION__
The Soviet Army parade in honour of the victory over Japan.
In October 1944, the existing military and political situation did not favour these plans. That was when Churchill set himself the task of getting the Soviet Union to consent to a "division of the Balkans into spheres of influence''. This plan foundered, too. In his memoirs Churchill tried belatedly to clear himself and to attribute to the Soviet Union the very same imperialist policy which the ruling elite in the West sought to implement with regard to the Balkan countries.
Hence the story about the division of the Balkans into "spheres of influence" which was so readily picked up by many bourgeois historians.
To set the record straight, here is the transcript of the conversation that Stalin had with Churchill on October 9, 1944, from the archives of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs: "Churchill announced that he had prepared a rather rough and clumsy document that showed the distribution of Soviet and British influence in Romania, Greece, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. The table was drawn up by him to show what the British think on this question.''
The Soviet record of the talks makes it clear that Churchill did propound the idea of partitioning some of the countries into spheres of influence. This gave the Soviet government a lead on the true intentions of the British .ruling elite. But Churchill's contention that Stalin had consented to such a partition is far from truth.^^2^^
More proof of Churchill's misstatement is a recently declassified British record of this conversation which confirms that Stalin gave no consent to the partition proposed by Churchill.^^3^^
Some Western historians doubt both Churchill's version and the interpretation by their more reactionary colleagues of Soviet policy in the countries liberated by the Soviet army. Gabriel Kolko, for example, points to the realism of Soviet _-_-_
^^1^^ Kent Roberts Greenfield, American Strategy in World War II. A Reconsideration, The John Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1963. p. 70.
~^^2^^ I. Zemskov, "The `Partition' of Yugoslavia into 'Spheres of Influence"', International Affairs (Moscow), August 19,58, No. 8, p. 57.
^^3^^ Public Record Office, Prem. 3, 434/4, p. 6.
145 policy. In his words it was quite clear by October 1944, that "the Soviet Union was pursuing a pluralistic policy in Eastern Europe based on the specific political conditions in each country".^^1^^These and other documents prove that by dispatching its armed forces to liberate the countries of Europe and Asia from fascism the Soviet government, strictly in accordance with international law, rendered massive assistance to the peoples who had risen against Germano-Italian fascism and Japanese militarism.^^2^^
The bourgeois thesis of "exporting revolution" has clearly anti-Soviet implications. As Lenin put it, "Revolutions are not made to order, they cannot be timed for any particular moment; they mature in a process of historical development and break out at a moment determined by a whole complex of internal and external causes.''^^3^^
As is known, the capitalist system still exists in a number of countries where Soviet troops once had their battle stations (Norway, Denmark, Austria, Iran, Finland). At the same time, Soviet troops never reached Albania, Vietnam, or Cuba which, nevertheless, did have revolutions.
Some reactionary authors who do not so much as bother themselves with facts, make gratuitous accusations of `` savagery'', ``looting'' and ``violence'' allegedly committed by the Soviet army in the countries it liberated.^^4^^
_-_-_^^1^^ Quoted from: Joseph M. Siracusa, New Left Diplomatic Histories and Historians. Kermikat Press, Inc., New York-London, 1973, p. 96.
^^2^^ For more on this see: The Liberation Mission of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Second World War, S. S. Khromov, N. I. Shishov, "Wartime Cooperation in the Struggle Against Fascism'', Voprosyistorii, 1975, No. 5, pp. 3-21 (both in Russian).
^^3^^ V. I. Lenin "Report Delivered at a Moscow Gubernia Conference of Factory Committees July 23, 1918'', Collected Works, Vol. 27, 1965, p. 547.
~^^4^^ John Toland, The Last 100 Days. Random House, New York, 1966, p. 566, etc. Cornelius Ryan's book, The Last Battle, which has been strongly criticised by Soviet historians, is full of slanderous accusations against the Soviet army. See: D. Kraminov, "Falsifiers. __NOTE__ Footnote cont. on page 147. 146
All these accusations are wide of the mark. Brought up since childhood in the spirit of proletarian internationalism, Soviet soldiers did not nurture feelings of revenge for the German people, nor for the peoples of the countries which had been Germany's allies and satellites. The Soviet government and the Communist Party had repeatedly stressed that the Soviet Union was'waging the war against German fascism, and not against the German people. As the Soviet troops approached the German frontier, Stalin, who was the Supreme Commander of the Soviet Armed Forces issued an order (on January 19, 1945) that the personnel of the Soviet armed forces should not permit instances of maltreatment of German civilians.^^1^^
The Soviet army entered Germany with the sole purpose of carrying out the joint decisions of the Allied powers, to bring the defeat of nazism to completion and to help the German people rid themselves of the fascist yoke and build a new life on democratic principles. All actions of the Soviet soldiers on German soil were imbued with the spirit of internationalism and profound humanity. Here is an example. The Nazis were holding a house in Berlin, obstructing the advance of the Soviet troops. In spite of that, the Soviet soldiers asked the supporting artillery battery and tankmen not to destroy the building so as to save the life of the women and children on the ground floor and in the basement^^2^^. Another illustration of the humanity and real nobility of the Soviet soldier is the heroic feat of Nikolai Masalov who, under heavy enemy fire saved a small German girl at the risk of his own life. There are many such examples.^^3^^
Ryan, Toland and others contend that German civilians _-_-_ __NOTE__ Footnote cont. from page 146. Whom Does Mr. Rvan Want to Please?'', Pravda, July 10, 1966; I. Zaitsev, "Mr. Ryan Draws the Long Bow'', Za rubezhom, No. 34, August 19--26, 1966, pp. 19--20; War, History, Ideology, Moscow, 1974, pp. 164--166 (in Russian).
~^^1^^ See: Fifty Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR, p. 394. (in Russian).
~^^2^^ See: F. D. Vorobyov, I. V. Parotkin, A. N. Shimansky, The Last Assault, Moscow, 1975, p. 338 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 339.
__PRINTERS_P_148_COMMENT__ 9* 147 were in constant fear of the Soviet army, but they keep silent about the fact that this unfounded fear had been stoked up by the Goebbels propaganda media which kept rubbing it in that to fall into Russian hands was worse than death itself. It is well to recall in this connection that on April 28 Hitler ordered that the dams that separated the Landwer Canal from the tunnels of the underground railway be blown up. The water from the canal began to flood the tunnels. This was something none of the Berliners hiding in the tunnels from bombs, artillery shells and bullets had expected. Thousands of people, mostly children, women, old folk and wounded soldiers were drowned in the tunnels that day.Immediately after the formal capitulation of Berlin, the Soviet command took measures to provide the civilians with food. Already on May 2, 1945, field kitchens were set up in different places of the city so that German children, women, old people and those of the' soldiers who had surrendered voluntarily could have their meals. Significantly, the four years of the war, the atrocities that the Nazis had perpetrated on Soviet soil did not make Soviet soldiers cruel and vengeful towards the Germans.
The Soviet army command took urgent measures to restore electric power stations, water supply, sewerage and city transport. By the beginning of June the underground railway and the tram service were back in operation, and water, gas and power supply had been restored. The concern shown by the Soviet troops for the civilian population of Germany began to dispel the thick haze of fascist propaganda. "We did not expect such magnanimity towards the Germans,'' said a German doctor after the liberation of the city.^^1^^ A Berlin electrician summed up the new situation in the city in those words: "The weeks of nightmare are over. The Nazis were trying to scare us, saying that the Russians would send all Germans into eternal slavery in cold Siberia. Now we can see that all that was nothing but a barefaced lie.''^^2^^
_-_-_^^1^^ The Last Assault, p. 376.
^^2^^ Ibidem.
148However, with all their references to ``objective'' facts and their impartial treatment of events, neither Toland, nor Sulzberger, nor Ryan, nor any other Western authors say anything about this assistance. Toland says, for instance, that all he has written is based on eye-witness reports of people he met and talked to. Doubts about the authenticity of such reports have been voiced by Brigadier General S. Marshall, who is far from friendly to the Soviet Union. In a review on Toland's book The Last 700 Days, Marshall writes: "Toland draws heavily on statements from principals and eyewitnesses, which he gathered years later. Though that deserves orchids for enterprise, as all historians know, it is dangerously tricky material.''^^1^^ In this case Marshall noticed, and quite correctly so, a peculiarity not only of Toland's book but in fact of most of other authors specialising in the armed struggle on the Soviet-German front: the dubious origin of the sources used in their books.
The heroic internationalist mission of the Soviet army in the war brought it undying fame throughout the world. Having completed this liberation mission, the Soviet Union helped the peoples of many countries to consolidate their freedom and independence, and protected them from counterrevolutionary encroachments by world imperialism. "Those who went through the Second World War and took part in the anti-fascist struggle will never forget the Soviet Union's exceptional role in the battle for the freedom of nations, its sacrifices, and the heroism of its people and army. They will never forget that the Soviet Union's struggle and sacrifices enabled many nations to regain their national freedom and state independence, and also to start fighting for the working-class victory, for the way to socialism,''^^2^^ said Gustav Husak, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. This is the truth of history.
_-_-_^^1^^ S.LA.Marshall, ``Gotterdarnmerung''. The New York Times Book Review, February 13, 1966, pp. 1,51.
~^^2^^ International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, Moscow, 1969. Peace and Socialism Publishers, Prague, 1969, pp. 404--405.
149 __ALPHA_LVL2__ ON THE SOVIET CONTRIBUTIONThe Soviet Union's decision to enter into the war against Japan was prompted by its Allied commitments and served the interests of the peoples of all countries engulfed in the world conflagration. The Soviet Union had to ensure the safety of its Far Eastern borders, which Japan had threatened throughout the entire history of the Soviet state. Japan's conduct was menacing when the situation on the Soviet-German front was particularly grave for the USSR. It was then that Japan, acting in violation of the SovietJapanese Treaty of Neutrality, had its forces poised.for attack on the USSR, and kept putting it off solely because of the continual reversals that the Wehrmacht suffered at the hands of the Soviet army. The treacherous policy of the Japanese government tied up 40 Soviet divisions on the Far Eastern borders throughout the entire period of the war at a time when these forces could have been used in the fight against the Nazis.^^1^^ Thus, the Soviet Union's war against Japan was a logical continuation of the Great Patriotic War.^^2^^
The Soviet contribution to the victory over militarist Japan has for a long time been a subject for discussion in the bourgeois literature about the Second World War. Asked by American historians about the Soviet role in the victory over Japan, President Truman said curtly: "No military contribution was made by the Russians toward victory over Japan.'' This irresponsible statement, rare even among bourgeois politicians, was made public in an official American study on the Second World War,^^3^^ and was later picked _-_-_
~^^1^^ A. M. Samsonov, The End of Fascist Aggression. Historical Essays. Moscow, 1980, p. 693 (in Russian).
^^2^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 11, 1979, p. 6.
~^^3^^ The Army Air Forces in World War II. Vol. 5, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1953, p. 712.
150 up by many bourgeois historians and memoir-writers. Louis Morton set out to prove that by the summer of 194.5 Japan had been utterly defeated, which meant that the Soviet Union's entry into the war was not in answer to the Allied request.^^1^^ Raymond Garthoff used this distorted interpretation of the events in the Far East in order to discredit the wartime policy of the Soviet Union. He writes: "Having been promised most of their objectives by the Western Allies at Yalta as reward for assistance against the Japanese, the Russians denounced their non-aggression treaty and then, while it was still in effect, attacked in August 1945. They would in any case have stepped in to share in the fruits of victory, but Stalin was able to minimize the blame for his violation of the non-aggression treaty by requesting, and getting, a letter from President Truman asking the USSR to enter the war.''^^2^^But history is a severe judge of anyone who tries to distort it.
The epic battles on the S.oviet-German front which turned the tide of the Second World War prompted the belligerents to revise their Pacific strategy and forced the Japanese command to assume the defensive.
The C-in-C of the U.S. forces in the Far East, General MacArthur, issued a communique, not long before the surrender of his Philippines garrison in 1942, declaring that "the world situation at the present time indicates that the hopes of civilisation rest on the worthy banners of the courageous Russian Army".^^3^^
The defeat of Nazi Germany and its surrender predetermined the outcome of the war. But the victory over Nazi Germany did not automatically bring Japan to her knees. It took time and effort to rout the Japanese aggressors and in this way to end the Second World War.
According to George Kennan, "At the Second Quebec _-_-_
^^1^^ Louis Morton, "Soviet Intervention in the War with Japan'', Foreign Affairs, Vol. 40, July 1962, No. 4, p. 662.
^^2^^ Raymond L. Garthoff, Soviet Military Policy. A Historical Analysis. Frederick A. Praeger Publishers, New York, 1966, p. 19.
~^^3^^ William Manchester, American Caesar. A Dell Book, New York, 1979, p. 283.
151 Conference, in September 1944... the Combined Chiefs of Staff took as the target date for the Japanese surrender a time eighteen months after the end of the war with Germany."This means that the war was expected to last until late 1946''.^^1^^ The Allied armed forces were yet to rout a fivemillion-strong Japanese army which included several thousand kamikazes. U.S. military circles were particularly worried about the presence of Japanese troops in Manchuria and other border areas of the USSR where Japan had two-thirds of her tanks, half her artillery and the elite imperial divisions. The Americans regarded them as the cream of the Japanese army and believed that any prolonged fighting with them would increase American casualties by more than a million. It is true, though, that some American historians sought to belittle the actual might of the Kwantung Army, and failed to provide any cogent facts on this point.^^2^^As the American army moved closer and closer to Japan, the Japanese stiffened their resistance. On June 18, 194.5, General George C.Marshall, the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, told President Truman at the White House that in the battles for the islands of Iwo Jima and Okinawa the Americans lost three times as many troops as in the battles for the islands of Leyte and Luson. The Japanese militarists announced total mobilisation, as the Nazis had done in Germany, and in this way hoped to turn Japan into an impregnable fortress. General Marshall pointed out that the Soviet Union's entry into the war might be crucial in forcing Japan to surrender.
Kent Greenfield believes, however, that the American Chiefs of Staff misjudged the situation. In his view, "in combination with naval power, the air forces of the United States _-_-_
~^^1^^ George F. Kennan, Russia and the West under Lenin and Stalin. Little, Brown and Company, Boston, etc., 1961, p. 378.
^^2^^ Military Affairs, Vol. XXXIII, No. 2, October 1969, pp. 313--314. The Japanese historian A. Fujiwara, in a paper presented at a conference in Moscow (November 1975) gave some figures about the Kwantung Army according to which its total strength, with all its auxiliary forces, stood at 1.2 million by the time the Soviet Union entered the war with Japan, which roughly tallies with Soviet estimates.
152 forced the Japanese to surrender without an invasion of their homeland by the Army".^^1^^ But Greenfield says nothing about the fact that by the beginning of 194.5 the Japanese invaders had scored major military successes in China. The Japanese advanced; to the southwestern parts of that country and linked up with their troops operating in French Indochina, thus establishing an unbroken frontline from Peking to Singapore. Japan's land forces were still very strong and there was still a long struggle ahead to destroy them.All that led the United States and Britain to ask the Soviet government to join in the war against Japan.
Loyal to its Allied commitments, the Soviet Union entered the war with Japan on August 8, 194,5, the agreed date, and struck a crushing blow at the strongest land forces of the Japanese army. Fighting was raging in Manchuria, Korea, South Sakhalin, and the Kuril Islands. In those days President Truman said that the U.S. government "gladly welcomed into this struggle ... our gallant and victorious ally".^^2^^ A few years later he would forget these words and say "dropping the bombs ended the war".^^3^^
This last statement was immediately pounced upon as axiomatic truth. What is more, The Reader's Digest Association, in its book Great Events of the 20th Century, which in part dealt with the Second World War, does not so much as mention the fact that the Soviet Union also fought in the Far East. The last days of the war are described in these words: "On August 6, 194,5, an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, and the world was profoundly changed. Even the devastation of the previous six years seemed to pale in comparison with the nightmarish power of this _-_-_
^^1^^ Kent Roberts Greenfield, American Strategy in World War II, p. 87.
~^^2^^ Quoted from: Pauline Tompkins, American-Russian Relations in the Far East. The Macmillan Company, New York, 1949, p. 297.
^^3^^ The Army Air Force in World War II. Vol, 5, p. 712.
153 weapon. It ended the Second World War.''^^1^^ Der grosse Atlas zum II. Weltkrieg published in the FRG reads th?>.t Japan surrendered only "after two atomic bombs had t een dropped on it".^^2^^ World War II written by a group of British authors also claims that "the Atomic Bomb afforded their Emperor the excuse to accept an Unconditional Surrender, which had become inevitable".^^3^^Moreover, their authors avoid giving a fair evaluation of this barbarous act which killed hundreds of thousands of civilians and served as a tool of atomic blackmail against the Soviet Union and all progressive forces.
Significantly, in Japan itself the importance of the USSR's entry into the war (before and after the American atomic bombing raids) was at the time given a different interpretation from that of many historians in the United States today. "It is absolutely necessary, regardless of how the war against Britain and America may develop, that our Empire make supreme efforts to prevent the USSR from participating in the war against us because this will be a fatal blow to our Empire,"^^4^^ reads the communique of the supreme council of war which met in Tokyo in May 1945.
Also worthy of note is the following view of some Japanese historians. "Although the United States is attempting to present the atomic bombing of Japanese cities as the result of its decision to put an early end to the war, in actual fact these bombs did not bend the Japanese government in favour of ending the war, in spite of the vast number of people killed.... It was not the civilian victims of the atomic bombing, but the fear of revolution in case the Soviet Union entered the war, that brought it to an early conclusion.''^^5^^ At its first meeting (August 9, 1945) after the _-_-_
^^1^^ Great Events of the 20th Century. How They Changed Our Lives. The Reader's Digest Association (Canada), Limited, Montreal, 1977, p. 358.
~^^2^^ Der grosse Atlas zum II. Weltkrieg. Sudwest Verlag. Miinchen, 1975, S. 280.
~^^3^^ World War II. Land Sea and Air Battles 1939--1945. Sundial Books Limited, London, 1977, p. 9.
^^4^^ Lester Brooks, Behind Japan's Surrender. McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, etc., 1968, p. 138.
~^^5^^ Nihon rektshi (A History of Japan), Vol. 21, Tokyo, 1977, pp. 360--361.
154 American atomic attacks, the Japanese cabinet discussed the new situation following the entry of the USSR into the war, and not the effect of atomic explosions on the military operations. Speaking before the supreme council of war, Prime Minister Suzuki said: "By entering the war this morning the Soviet Union has put us in a desperate position and has rendered its further prosecution impossible.''^^1^^Another version of the events which is clearly aimed at denigrating the Soviet armed forces that took part in the war against Japan comes from Raymond Garthoff whom we mentioned earlier in this account. In an article, "The Soviet Manchurian Campaign, August 1945" published in Military Affairs, he writes that the Soviet Union entered the war against Japan before it had a chance to complete its "preparations for the offensive by 9 August. There were grounds to conclude that the Soviet decision to launch their campaign was suddenly precipitated somewhat earlier than they had planned.... The decision had been prompted by the first American atomic attack on Japan on 6 August.''^^2^^ The American historian either does not know or ignores some well-established facts. It is well known, for example that the Soviet armed forces started their preparations for war against Japan after the Crimean Conference where Britain and the United States insisted on Soviet participation in the military operations against Japan, and where the Soviet government gave its consent to join in that war. On February 11, 1945, the leaders of the three powers signed an agreement committing the USSR to start military operations against Japan two or three months after the defeat of Germany.
The Supreme Command of the Soviet Armed Forces planned to deliver two main strikes-from the Mongolian People's Republic and the Soviet Maritime Region-and several Auxiliary strikes converging on the Manchurian heartland. It was proposed that the Kwantung Army be .surrounded, dissected and destroyed.
_-_-_^^1^^ Inoue Kieshi, et al., A History of Modern Japan. Moscow, 1955, pp. 263--264 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Military Affairs, October 1969, p. 314.
155A vast number of Soviet troops were concentrated in the Far East. In addition to the 40 divisions already stationed there the Soviet command moved the 39th and the 5th armies over from eastern Prussia, the 53rd infantry and the 6th Guards tank armies and the cavalry group from Prague to the Far East. Between May and July a total of 136,000 carloads of troops and equipment arrived by railway from the West to the Soviet Far East and the regions south of Lake Baikal.^^1^^ To conduct the operation the Supreme Command set up the High Command of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Far East and organised three Fronts: the Transbaikal Front, the 1st Far Eastern Front and the 2nd Far Eastern Front. The commander-in-chief of the Soviet armed forces in the Far East was Marshal Alexander Vassilevsky. Operationally attached to the Transbaikal Front were almost all the armed forces of the Mongolian People's Republic under the command of Marshal Choibalsan. The operations of the Pacific Fleet and the Amur Flotilla with land-based troops were directed by the outstanding Soviet naval commander, Admiral of the Fleet Nikolai Kuznetsov. The directives for the fronts were endorsed by the GHQ Supreme Command on June 28, 1945.^^2^^ All preparations had been completed on time, so that the Soviet Union was able to start the war against Japan three months after the surrender of Nazi Germany, as had been agreed at the Crimean Conference.
The crushing blows of the Soviet army supported by the offensive of the Mongolian armed forces and by the actions of the patriotic forces of other countries reversed the entire strategic situation in the Far East and gave a powerful impetus to the national liberation struggle of the peoples, to the revolutionary rising of the Japanese working class against the militarist clique which had brought disaster on the country. All these circumstances led eventually to Japan's unconditional surrender.
_-_-_~^^1^^ The Great Patriotic War 1941--1945. A Short History, p. 543 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Alexander Vassilevsky, The Cause of My Life, Moscow, 1975, pp. 562--563 (in Russian).
156 __ALPHA_LVL2__ WHY IS THE BOURGEOIS CONCEPTThe concept of "decisive battles" was originated in the welter of propaganda activities at the U.S. Defense Department at the close of the war.
In 1945 the U.S. Defense Department brought out A Brief History of World War II containing many fair and objective assessments which later vanished from official American publications. However, even this book showed a marked tendency towards distortion of facts. For example, its authors attempted to equate the significance of the battle off the island of Midway, or the Anglo-American landing in North Africa with that of the Battle of Stalingrad. "The news [of the victory off the island of Midway-Author] was the best to reach Americans in 1942 and was to be equaled only by the British and American landings in North Africa and the Russian victory at Stalingrad.''^^1^^
In 1948, the British military historian and theoretician General Fuller went as far as to compare the Nazi defeat at Stalingrad with the victory of Anglo-American troops in Tunisia in May 1943. Summing up the results of the battle of Stalingrad he wrote: "...The initiative finally passed from the Germans to the Russians, as three months later it passed into Anglo-American hands at the Battle of Tunis; for the surrender of von Arnim's army in the Cape Bon Peninsula was the Stalingrad of North Africa.''^^2^^ The same idea was pushed by the beaten Nazi generals. "The drama in Africa and at Stalingrad,'' they said, "served as a stern warning that the German people had reached the turning point of their history.''^^3^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ The World at War 1939--1944. A Brief History of World War II, p. 166.
~^^2^^ J.F.C. Fuller, The Second World War 1939--1945. London, Eyre and Spottishwoode, Ltd.,. 1948, p. 257.
^^3^^ Weltkrieg 1939--1945. Ehrenbuch der Deutschen Wehrmacht. Buch-und Zeitschriften Verlag, Dr. Hans Rieger, Stuttgart, 1954, S. 167.
157The number of "decisive battles" was rising steadily. Midway, Guadalcanal, til Alamein, Tunis, Morocco, Stalingrad and the end of the fifth phase of the Battle of the Atlantic reversed the course of the Second World War, wrote the West German historians Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, and Hans Dolinger.^^1^^ Brigadier General Peter Young proceeds from the chronological principle; "Truly the tide had turned in those November days of 1942 when Montgomery emerged victorious from the field of El Alamein; when Eisenhower's host set foot on the shores of North Africa; and when, ifter an epic defence, the Russians encircled their besiegers on the banks of the Volga.''^^2^^
In the main, the concept of "decisive battles" took shape in the mid-1960s, although it was quite clear even earlier that it was aimed at giving credit for the final victory to the battles fought and won by the Anglo-American allies and to the theatres where their troops were active. In other words, the authors of this concept tried to convince the reader that the decisive contribution to the defeat of the fascist-militarist bloc was made by Britain and the United States, ind not by the Soviet Union.
Some historians put it even more bluntly, saying that their aim was to prove the crucial role of the United States in the Second World War. In his World War II Dupuy writes that he "has attempted to record the entire conflict hoping to orient the reader that he will be familiar with the outline of the vast picture while at the same time appreciating the decisive part played by the United States in the free world's victory over the powers of totalitarianism"^^3^^ The first chapter in this book is entitled "Japan Attacks Pearl Harbor"' as if to assign to the United States the role of "architect of victory'', which it was not in fact to fulfill.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Hans Dolinger, Zweite Weltkrieg im Bildern und Dokummte. Bd. 2, Miinchen, Wien, Basel, 1963, S. 231.
~^^2^^ Peter Young, World War 1939--1945. A Short History. Arthur Barker Limited, London, 1966, p. 246.
~^^3^^ Richard Dupuy, World War II. A Compact History. New York, 1969, p. VII.
158Battles Lost and Won, written in the 1960s by Hanson Baldwin, military editor of The New York"Times, is conspicuous among the many books written on the subject. It describes eleven episodes of the war vastly varying in their importance: the Polish campaign of 1939, the Battle of Britain, the landing on the Island of Crete, the fighting for Corregidor, the Battle of Stalingrad, the fighting for the Tarawa Atoll, the landings in Sicily and Normandy, the sea battle in Leyte Gulf, the battles of the Ardennes and Okinawa.^^1^^
Western authors are not unanimous on the number of decisive battles, some counting up to twenty, others mentioning only five. But whatever the number, all of them attach particular importance to the theatres in which the armed forces of the United States and Britain took part. It is easy to see that Baldwin and those who share his views say nothing about the battles of Moscow and Kursk, and other important battles on the SovietGerman front. A notable exception is the Battle of Stalingrad which they consider crucial.
Of the battles which reversed the course of the war those authors most often mention three fought on land-at Stalingrad, at El Alamein and Tunis, md two sea battles: off the island of Midway and on the island of Guadalcanal.
The said battles stand very far apart in regard to the scale and intensity of the lighting and, what is particularly important, their military and political impact. In their in-depth study of this problem Soviet historians put the spotlight on the following facts.
At El Alamein in 1942, the British were confronted by four German and eight Italian divisions totalling _-_-_
~^^1^^ Hanson Baldwin, Batiks Lost and Won. Great Campaigns of World War II. Harper & Row Publishers, New York, 1968.
159 80,000 men. In the course of the successful British offensive the backbone of the joint German-Italian force avoided a debacle. By contrast the Nazi force at Stalingrad was more than one million strong. In the period between November 19, 1942 and February 2, 1943 alone, when the Soviet troops carried out their sweeping counteroffensive at Stalingrad, more than 300,000 German troops (thirty-two divisions and three brigades of Nazi Germany and her satellites) were completely destroyed and sixteen divisions were partially destroyed. The enemy lost more than 800,000 troops.^^1^^The Battle of Stalingrad played the key role in turning the tide of the war and was followed up by many other successful operations. The battle of El Alamein did not and could not have had that impact on the entire course of the war.^^2^^
The losses of the Italo-German troops in Tunisia (May 1943) are often greatly exaggerated in the Western literature. Most of the Western authors put them at 250,000, and some American historians put them even higher. Robert Beitzell, for instance, contends that as many as 275,000 men surrendered at Tunis. Trying at the same time to minimise the role of the Battle of Stalingrad he says: "Psychologically and militarily, Stalingrad was the greater Allied victory. In terms of strategy and wastage of Axis resources, Tunis was more immediately productive.''^^3^^
Several years ago Basil H. Liddell Hart wrote that the actual number of troops taken prisoner (mostly emaciated and demoralised Italian soldiers) was much smaller. He quotes an operational report of Army Group Afrika dispatched to Rome on May 2, which said that prior to the fiercest fighting in this sector of the front the strength of the enemy force varied between 170,000 and _-_-_
^^1^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 6, 1976, p. 81.
~^^2^^ Eisenhower summed up the battle of El Alamein as a "brilliant tactical victory" (Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe. Da Capo Press, New York, 1977, p. 115).
~^^3^^ Robert Beitzell, The Uneasy Alliance. America, Britain and Russia, 1941--1943. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1972, pp. 6.5-66.
160 180,000.^^1^^ Another British historian, AJ.P. Taylor, sheds additional light on this issue when he writes: "The Allies took some 130,000 prisoners who swelled in postwar accounts to a quarter of a million.''^^2^^Almost all Western historians refer to the landing of American Marines on the island of Guadalcanal in August 1942 as the start of the counter-offensive in the Pacific.^^3^^ This conclusion can hardly be justified, for the operation was in fact a tactical offensive and had a strategically defensive aim to reduce Japan's military threat to Australia. And there is certainly no grounds for calling the fighting for Guadalcanal a "Stalingrad of the Pacific'', as Bauer does in his book.^^4^^
The battle off Midway on June 4-6, 1942, was one of the biggest sea engagements of the Second World War. In it a large Japanese naval force which struck the U.S. naval base on the island was defeated and made to withdraw. The Japanese lost four aircraft carriers, one heavy cruiser, and 332 aircraft (most of them sunk together with the aircraft carriers); the Americans lost one aircraft carrier, one destroyer and 150 aircraft.
Despite her heavy losses, the Battle of Midway did not deprive Japan of her military superiority in the Pacific and in fact did not have a marked effect on the progress of the Second World War.^^5^^
It is noteworthy that American historians, including those in government service, took a more objective view of the Battle of Midway at the time, saving that "the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Basil H. Liddell Hart, History of the Second World War. G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1971, p. 431.
~^^2^^ A. J. P. Taylor, The Second World War. Hamish Hamilton, London, 1975, p. 172.
~^^3^^ John Miller, Guadalcanal. The first Offensive. Washington, De partment of the Army, 1949; Robert Leckie, Challenge for the Pacific: Guadalcanal, the Turning Point of the War. Doubleday, New York, 1965; American Military History. Washington, 1973, pp. 502--503.
~^^4^^ Eddy Bauer, La derniere guerre ou histoire contnvente de la deuxieme guerre mondiale. Grange Bateliere, Paris, 1974, Tome (i, p. 166.
~^^5^^ For more on the subject see: S. G. Gorshkov, The Naval Power of the State, Moscow, 197(i, pp. 186--190 (in Russian).
__PRINTERS_P_161_COMMENT__ 10--682 161 naval war in the Pacific changed from passive defensive to active defense''.^^1^^The criteria that Western historians apply for judging the importance of battles in secondary theatres cannot be called scientific. For example, Hanson Baldwin has put the battle for Tarawa Atoll in the Pacific at the end of 1943 into the category of "decisive battles''. RearAdmiral S.E. Morison even called it "the seed b<ed of victory in 1945".^^2^^ But the scale of the military operations and the results achieved give no reason for such a sweeping conclusion, for the 12,000-strong American landing party broke the resistance of a small Japanese garrison, and that only after long and bitter fighting.
It should be noted that the concept of "decisive battles" is shared by far from all Western historians. Some of the less biased researchers attach primary importance to the fighting on the Soviet-German front. Looking back on the Battle of Stalingrad Henry Michel (France) writes that "Soviet historians are quite right when they regard this brilliant success of the Red Army as the decisive victory which turned the tide of the Second World war".^^3^^ A similar thought about the significance of the Battle of Stalingrad was voiced by H. Heiss at an international seminar devoted to the fortieth anniversary of this great event (held in West Berlin in June 1982). AJ.P. Taylor writes: "The fig-Ming strength of the German army was and always remained on the Eastern front.''^^4^^
Though few and far between, fair and objective assessments do crop up in the works of American historians, too. In an article published in The American Historical Review, Louis Morton writes: "Fought quite sepaiutely from the war in the West, the Soviet-German war was by all odds the biggest, bloodiest, most decisive theatre _-_-_
~^^1^^ The World at War 1939--1944. A Brief History of World War II, p. 164.
~^^2^^ Quoted from: Basil H. Liddell Hart, History of the Second World War. Pan Books, Ltd., London, 1978, p. 535.
~^^3^^ Henri Michel, La seconde guerre mondiale. Tome 1, Presse Universitaires de France, Paris, 1977, p. 467.
^^4^^ A. J. P. Taylor, The Second World War, p. 188.
162 of World War II, dwarfing the Allied effort in the West and involving vast armies along a front stretching over a thousand miles.''^^1^^ Such assessments undoubtedly help get a more correct and objective view of the size and nature of the American contribution to the victory over the aggressors.Over the past ten years the concept of "decisive battles" has undergone some changes.
On the one hand, some of the Western historians have renounced the old contention that only the Battle of Stalingrad was of crucial significance to the outcome of the Second World War as a whole. The prevalent view today is that the battles of Moscow and Kursk were also crucial to the victory. In his book, The Crucial Years 1939--194 7, Hanson Baldwin has reversed his previous stance and writes that "the Battle of Moscow undoubtedly was a turning point in World War II-more so than Stalingrad".^^2^^ "The German invasion of Russia and the greatest land battle in the history of warfare that followed produced global political, psychological, and military results,"^^3^^ he writes, summing up the situation at the end of 1941.
On the other hand, attempts are being made to put a more attractive complexion on the concept of decisive battles and make it sound more credible.
A good illustration of this point is the host of publications brought out in the 1970s on the crucial battles of the Second World War. These include Henry Maule's study The Great Battles of World War II^^4^^ and the book _-_-_
~^^1^^ The American Historical Review. Vol. LXXV, No. 7, December 1970, p. 1993.
~^^2^^ Hanson W. Baldwin, The Crucial Years 1939--1941. The World at War, Harper & Row Publishers, New York, 1976, p. 346.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 350.
~^^4^^ Henry Maule, The Great Battles of World War II. Harrold and Sons, Limited, London, 1976.
__PRINTERS_P_163_COMMENT__ 10* 163 Decisive Battles of the 20th Century^^1^^ edited by N. Frankland and C. Dowling. Maule singles out thirteen battles (Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, Keren, Cyrenaica, the Battle of Moscow, Midway, Guadalcanal, El Alamein, the Battle of Stalingrad, Ancio, Imphal, Normandy, Rangoon); Frankland and Dowling name 14 (the battles of the Atlantic, of Britain, France, the Battle of Moscow, Pearl Harbor, Singapore, Midway, El Alamein, the Battle of Stalingrad, the Battle of Kursk, Schweinfurt, Imphal-Kohima, Normandy, Leyte). As we see, the battles of Moscow, Stalingrad and Kursk, also the Battle of Britain, the Allied landing in Normandy are all bracketed with operations of much lesser significance (near Keren in Eritrea, in Cyrenaica, etc.).Maule gives full credit for the victory of the Soviet troops near Moscow to Britain. He writes: "Had Hitler not committed Germany to fighting on two fronts,... Moscow must have fallen.''^^2^^ Harrison Salisbury, who as co-author of Decisive Battles penned the section on the Battle of Moscow, though given to inventions (that the exact strength of the Soviet forces in the offensive was not known, or that Stalin was rumoured to have fled Moscow), dismisses as untrue the story about the cold weather being the cause of the Nazi defeat at Moscow. "...H December Hitler had abandoned his offensive, blaming the severe winter weather. What was happening, however, was not a weather blitz. It was a fastmoving Soviet offensive which for the first time since Hitler had begun his career was compelling the Wehrmacht to reel back.~"^^3^^
Hanson Baldwin, by contrast, is trying, just as the Hitler generals did before him, to interpret the rout of the Nazi troops as solely due to natural conditions, "There was always one more river to cross; the endless horizon _-_-_
~^^1^^ Decisive Rattles of the 20th Century. Land, Sea and Air. Ed. by N. Frankland and C. Dowling. Sidgewick and Jackson, Limited, London, 197(i.
`` ' '
~^^2^^ Henry Maule, The Great Battles of ^ World War II. H. Regnery Company, Chicago, 1973, p. 168.
^^3^^ Decisive Battles of the 20th Century, p. 138.
164 stretched on and on. The land, the people, the climate and the environment were psychologically oppressive to men from Western Europe.... The cold had been, perhaps, the greatest enemy of all....''^^1^^ The same slant cuts across the book by the British historian'David Irving.^^2^^ But the very fact that Salisbury and Baldwin, known as experts on the Soviet-German front developments, give almost at the same time two distinctly different reasons for the defeat of the Nazi troops at Moscow testifies to the level of American research on the issue and makes it difficult for the reader to find out the truth.The attempt first made by N. Frankland to make out the American bombing raid on the ball-bearing plant at Schweinfurt on October 14, 1943, as one of the decisive battles of the Second World War, merits special attention. He writes about the American losses in that raid: out of the 291 bombers 60 aircraft did not return to base, 120 were damaged. According to Frankland, this air raid played a decisive role for two reasons: first, the Americans picked out an objective of great importance to the German war effort; second, the heavy losses of the American air force in that raid prompted radical change in the bombing tactics which enabled the Allies to reduce their losses in the future, increased the effectiveness of their air offensive which exposed Germany "to the threat of catastrophic destruction".^^3^^
It must be admitted that some Western historians maintain a more level-headed approach on the question of bombing attacks. Liddell Hart writes: "Until 1944 the strategic air offensive had fallen far short of the claims made for it, as an alternative to land invasion, and its effects had been greatly overestimated. The indiscriminate bombing of cities had not seriously diminished munitions production, while failing to break the will of the opposing peoples and compel them to surrender, as _-_-_
~^^1^^ Hanson W. Baldwin, The Crucial Years 1939--1941, pp. 320, 345.
~^^2^^ David Irving, Hitler's War. The Viking Press, New York, 1977, p. 350.
~^^3^^ Decisive Battles, p. 249.
165 expected.''^^1^^ The arguments offered by Taylor sound still more cogent: "In 1942, the British dropped 48,000 tons of bombs, and the Germans produced 36,804 weapons of war (heavy guns, tanks and aircraft). In 1943, the British and Americans dropped 207,600 tons of bombs; the Germans produced 71,693 weapons of war. In 1944, the British and Americans dropped 915,000 tons; the Germans produced 105,258 weapons of war.''^^2^^ Munitions production in Germany began to decline in the second half of 1944 primarily as the result of the Soviet army advance which deprived the Third Reich of some of its key sources of raw materials.The attempts to update the concept of decisive battles only proves its insolvency. For example, none of the modernised versions of this concept contain so much as a reference to the Byelorussian offensive of the Soviet armed forces (June 23-August 29, 1944) which was much more massive than all the major operations of the Western Allies in the land theatres of the war and is unmatched in the history of any other country.
The aim of the operation (codenamed Bagration) was to rout the Army Group Centre, to free Byelorussia and to support the actions of the Western Allies in Normandy as part of Allied cooperation against the Nazi bloc.
On June 6, 1944, Stalin wrote to Churchill: "The summer offensive of the Soviet troops, to be launched in keeping with the agreement reached at the Tehran Conference, will begin in mid-June in one of the vital sectors of the front.... Between late June and the end of July the operations will turn into a general offensive of the Soviet troops.''^^3^^
When the Soviet army mounted the offensive in Byelorussia the Nazis fielded sixty-three divisions and three brigades, with a total of 1,200,000 troops, more than 9,500 guns and mortars, 900 tanks and assault guns, about 1,350 aircraft. The enemy defence lines were from _-_-_
~^^1^^ Basil H. Liddell Hart, History of the Second World War, p. 712.
^^2^^ A.J.P. Taylor, The Second World War, p. 179.
~^^3^^ Correspondence..., Volume One, p. 224.
166 250 to 270 km deep, complete with a far-flung system of field fortifications and natural frontiers. The operation was carried out by four Fronts, which included nineteen field armies and two tank armies (166 divisions), also a number of other units and formations. Its total strength was 2,400,000 men, 36,000 guns and mortars, 5,200 tanks and self-propelled guns, and more than 5,000 aircraft. Acting in close cooperation with the Soviet troops were partisans. Actions of the Fronts were coordinated by GHQ Supreme Command representatives Marshal Zhukov and Marshal Vassilevsky.Taking part in this gigantic battle on both sides were 3,600,000 troops (more than 250 equivalent divisions) armed with 47,000 guns and mortars, more than 6,000 tanks, about 6,500 aircraft. Upon completion of the operation the Soviet troops advanced 550--600 km, drove the enemy out of Byelorussia, entered Poland and reached the suburbs of Warsaw. Army Group Centre was routed: 17 divisions were smashed and others were reduced to half of their strength. About 2,000 enemy aircraft and vast amounts of other ammunition were destroyed.
The success of Operation Bagration drastically changed the strategic situation in Europe, the decisive theatre of the war. The odds were now heavily against the Axis. The rout of the largest concentration of Nazi troops disorganised the Wehrmacht defences over the entire Soviet-German front, inflicted irreplaceable losses in personnel (up to 500,000 men), and brought nearer the day when the Soviet armed forces would break through to the vital centres of Germany, deep into the Balkans and in the direction of Czechoslovakia. The time was not far off when Germany would dispatch to the SovietGerman front the last of its reserves which could otherwise have been used against the Allies in Normandy.
The fascist bloc found itself in the clutches of a severe political crisis. The resistance movement became much stronger than before in the Nazi-occupied countries which the Soviet Union was approaching or had already set foot ia In August-September 1944, the fascist regimes were overthrown in Romania and Bulgaria. The two countries 167 lofi immediately took the side of the anti-Hitler coalition, which meant further curtailment of raw material supplies to the war-devastated German economy. The German political scene was one of tension, which climaxed in an attempt on Hitler's life on July 20, 1944. The growing international prestige of the Soviet Union and the Soviet Army gave inspiration to all those who were fighting against the fascist invaders, and further eroded the moral and political fibre of the Axis.
The Byelorussian operation is occasionally mentioned in the Western literature. Earl Ziemke, for example, devotes a whole chapter to it in his book. He speaks about the moral crisis of the Wehrmacht and concludes that "once he [the German soldier] could not even imagine the ultimate disaster-now he expected it"^^1^^ The British historian Alan Reid writes that the rout of Army Group Centre in the Byelorussian operation removed "forever the last vague hope of ever stemming the Russian tide".^^2^^ Nevertheless these two and other bourgeois authors are clearly'disinclined to give a fair assessment of the Byelorussian operation and its place in the Second World War. It may be recalled that the Soviet armed forces carried out more than 50 strategic operations by groups of Fronts, the Byelorussian operation being one of them.
Soviet historians give credit to the sizable contribution made by the United States, Britain and other Western Allies to the victory over the aggressors. In spite of the vast difference in the social systems of the USSR and the capitalist members of the anti-Hitler coalition, they could successfully work together in the struggle against the common enemy, look for and find mutually acceptable solutions on many disputed questions. British airmen, American seamen, French tankmen, other Allied forces fought courageously in the sky over the English Channel, at Bir Hakeim, Midway, El Alamein, in the waters of the Atlantic and in the Ardennes. The working people of the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Earl F. Ziemke, Stalingrad to Berlin, p. 345.
~^^2^^ Alan Reid, A Concise Encyclopedia of the Second World War. Osprey Publishing Limited, London, 1974, p. 1 Hi.
168 capitalist countries, members of the anti-Hitler coalition, and of their colonies helped to achieve an overwhelming superiority over the fascist bloc in the military and economic spheres. People of different nationalities, political views and persuasions were working in war industries and fighting on the battlefield, forging the grand victory. However, it so happened that the Soviet Union, the Soviet people and their armed forces made the decisive contribution to the defeat of the aggressors, as was recognised by many wartime political and military leaders in the West, by many of those who did the actual fighting and by a number of Western historians. "None can gainsay the gigantic effort by Soviet society nor gloss over the grievous hurts inflicted upon it, that numbing catalogue of bestiality, devastation, hardship and illumitable private griefs,'' writes J. Erickson.^^1^^ This fact has been reaffirmed in comprehensive studies and has been borne out by a great number of documents to the satisfaction of any unprejudiced reader. The objective assessment of the decisive contribution of the USSR to the victory over the aggressors is of overriding importance for the correct understanding of the results and lessons of the war, for the conclusions that we still draw from its history. _-_-_^^1^^ J. Erickson, The Road to Berlin, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1983^ p. IX.
[169] __NUMERIC_LVL1__ CHAPTER THREE __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE SOURCES OF VICTORYSpeaking before a group of historians who had gathered for an international conference at Sandhurst a few years ago, one of the American participants asked the Soviet representatives whether they agreed with his American colleagues who maintained that the extraordinary heroism and staunchness of the Red Army, displayed in the trying year of 1941, were accounted for by the natural qualities of the Russian soldier who had always selflessly defended his hearth and home from foreign invaders. Replying, a Soviet historian at the conference said, "The Red Army soldier during foreign military intervention in 1918--1920, and the Great Patriotic War, just like Russian soldiers in the past, selflessly defended their hearth and home, their family and their native land against foreign invaders. But there is a very important difference between the soldiers of the tsarist army and the soldiers of the Soviet army. The Soviet soldiers also defend their priceless gain-their own Soviet socialist system of government which, as they know from their own experience, has brought them and their families a happy life; this awareness generates unprecedented mass heroism and devotion to their martial duty, which distinguishes the army of the socialist state from the armies of any other country in the world.''
The sources of the victory of the Soviet Union in the war against the Nazi aggressors is one of the most topical and at the same time the most wantonly interpreted subjects in the Western literature. This applies to both the substance of the matter and the method of its treatment by bourgeois authors.
170The victory or defeat in war of a country depends on the strength of its social and state system, on the correlation of the class forces inside the country and in the international arena, the level of its economic development, moral strength and military might, the ability of the ruling classes and parties to lead the masses which are the main driving force of history, the Great Patriotic War being a case in point.
The outcome of the unprecedented struggle between the Soviet Armv and the Hitler Wehrmacht was determined by a number of circumstances, the most important of these being the advantages of the economic and political organisation of socialist society, and its advanced revolutionary ideology. During the Great Patriotic War the socialist system ensured the indestructible unity of Soviet society, the power and unprecedented mobility of its economy, the high level of development of military science, and produced many outstanding generals and military leaders.
Of the bourgeois researchers who are in possession of the ample proof of the economic, political and militarystrategic superiority of the Soviet Union over Nazi Germany, very few actually speak about the merits of the centralised planned economic system of the Soviet Union, the strength of the multi-national socialist state, the heroism of the Soviet people. However, even such authors fail or refuse to notice the sources of the permanent factors of the victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War, and ignore the close relationship between these factors and the advantages of socialism over capitalism. Nevertheless, the assessments made by those Western historians are important in so far as they stand in contrast to a certain extent to the malicious fabrications of the rabid enemies of socialism and of the Soviet Union.
It has been proved with abundant clarity that when wars are waged by highly developed states or by coalitions of states, their outcome is not determined by some accidental and unforeseen circumstance or even by mistakes of military leaders, however grave the consequences may be, and also that the ultimate winner is the country 171 or the coalition of states with a sum total of advantages in the economic, political and military organisation of society over those of its adversary. In spite of these obvious facts, the conception of the "accidental nature" of the victory of the Soviet Union, md of "missed victories" of Nazi Germany is still at the centre of attention of many bourgeois historians. Actually, there is nothing intricate about this line of reasoning. They say, for instance, that since the victory of the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War was the result of accidental circumstances, it cannot in any way testify to the strength and stability of the socialist system. In this way they try to cultivate the idea that it is possible to overpower socialism, that in the historical confrontation between socialism and capitalism the latter still has a chance of military victory. Arguments of this sort are widely used to brainwash the population and the military personnel of capitalist countries.
Western historians stand on shaky ground also when they try to explain the reasons for the defeat of Nazi Germany and its allies. They say, for example, that Nazi Germany's collapse was brought about by the mistakes of its political and military leaders, by the shortage of manpower and material resources, by the conditions of fighting in Russia that the Germans were not used to, and by other circumstances among which the efforts of the Soviet people to rout the Nazis are relegated to the background.
The victory of the Soviet Union and the' defeat of Nazi Germany are two dialectically interconnected sides of one and the same phenomenon. The superiority of one of the belligerents rendered the realisation by the other of its goals impossible. Let us now dwell in more detail on the main factors behind the victory of the Soviet Union.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ THE ECONOMIC FACTOROne of the decisive factors determining the progress of a war and its outcome is the economy as the 172 foundation of the military might of a state. "Victory or defeat prove to be dependent on material, that is, economic conditions,'' wrote Engels^^1^^ This idea was amplified by Lenin, who held that to wage a war in earnest a strong and organised rear was needed. "Even the best of armies,'' he said, "even people most sincerely devoted to the revolutionary cause will be immediately exterminated by the enemy, if they are not adequately armed, supplied with food and trained.''^^2^^
In the years of the struggle against the Nazi invaders, the Soviet people, under the leadership of the Communist Party, succeeded in putting the national economy on a war footing in a brief span of time-and that in spite of the unfavourable start of the hostilities-and in increasing the production of arms and ammunition, in providing the Soviet armed forces with all that was necessary for defeating the enemy.
The economic foundation for providing the Soviet armed forces with essentials in the event of an attack by a strong and well equipped enemy was laid in the period of socialist transformation in the USSR. One of the goals of the prewar five-year plans, as envisaged by the Soviet Communist Party and Government was to close the economic gap between the USSR and the developed capitalist countries. Having laid the foundations of socialist society, the Soviet people built a powerful and highly developed industry whose volume of output was ten times as great as that of pre-revolutionary Russia. In the years that preceded the war, big industrial centres sprang up in the Urals and Siberia to open the eastern part of the country to comprehensive development. Collectivisation of agriculture and mechanisation of farming ensured _-_-_
~^^1^^ Frederick Engels, Anti-Duhring, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1975, p. 205.
~^^2^^ V. I. Lenin, "On a Businesslike Basis'', Collected Works, Vol. 27, 1965, p. 76.
173 the victory of socialism in the countryside, which led to an increase in commodity production. The development of the planned socialist economy, which drew on the rich raw material resources of the country, nabled it to achieve economic independence and build up its defence capacity. The French military historian Aime Constantini, author of the three-volume treatise, L'Union Sovietique en guerre (1941--1945), writes that "by the time the Germans started their aggression, the Soviet Union was in a position to create a developed war economy. It had key industries with tremendous productivity and was in possession of vast resources of raw materials, fuel and electric energy.''^^1^^At the same time the Soviet Union was behind the advanced capitalist countries, including Nazi Germany, in the volume of output in important industries.
Even without the European countries it had occupied, or had made its satellites, Germany produced more coal, steel, aluminium, lead, and magnesium than did the Soviet Union. Germany's chemical, machine-tool manufacturing, automobile and some other industries produced more than the corresponding industries in the Soviet Union. Germany had more than twice as many machine-tools as the USSR.^^2^^ Its economic potential for aggression against the USSR was augmented considerably when Germany laid its hands on the industrial capacities of the * European countries it had occupied and on those of its allies. This helped Nazi Germany increase its resources of electric energy by 110 per cent, coal by 90 per cent, steel by 100 per cent, aluminium by 70 per cent, grain by 300 per cent.^^3^^ The occupied countries were the source of manpower Germany needed for war production. At the end of September 1944, 7.5 million workers who had _-_-_
~^^1^^ Aime Constantini, L'Union Sovietique en guerre (1941--1945). Imprimerie Nationale, Paris, 1968, t. I, p. 63.
~^^2^^ A History of the Second'World War 1939--1945. Vol. 3, pp. 285, 376--377.
^^3^^ Ibid., p. 285.
174 been transported from the occupied countries to Germany were employed in its industry and farming.^^1^^The war unleashed by the Nazis put the economic system of the socialist state to the severest of tests. Particularly difficult was the initial period of the Great Patriotic War which was extremely unfavourable for the USSR. Having a huge battle-ready army seasoned in major offensive operations, taking advantage of its superiority in manpower and materiel, and making the best of the factor of surprise, Germany succeeded in temporarily occupying a considerable part of Soviet territory with 40 per cent of the population of the USSR. The national economy was deprived of 63 per cent of its total output of coal, 35 per cent of manganese ore, 68 per cent of pig iron, 56 per cent of steel, 60 per cent of aluminium, 38 peir cent of grain, 38 per cent of cattle, and 60 per cent of pigs.^^2^^ Between July and November 1941, the volume of industrial output in the USSR dropped by more than 50 per cent. The enemy destroyed or shipped out of Soviet territory to Germany 175,000 metal-cutting machine-tools, 62 blast furnaces and 213 open hearth furnaces, 18 million tons of farm produce, 7 million horses, 17 million head of cattle.^^3^^
All this shows that in the initial period of the war, when the national economy was being put on a war footing, the Soviet Union lost a considerable part of its economic potential. Not only the leaders of the Nazi Reich but also most of the so-called Russian experts in America and Britain thought that the Soviet economy would not be able to stand up under such losses, and _-_-_
^^1^^ A History of Fascism in Western Europe. Moscow, 1978, p. 259 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ N. A. Voznessensky, The War-Time Economy of the USSR (1941-- 1945). Moscow, 1947, p. 42 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ Kommunist, No. 2, 1975, p. 68.
175 would collapse. These augurs did not take into consideration the most important features of the Soviet economyits socialist character. Back in September 1917, Lenin pointed out that the defence capacity of a country which throws off the capitalist yoke and gives land to the peasants, and puts the banks and factories under the workers' control, would be many times greater than the defence capacity of a capitalist country.^^1^^ This far-sighted idea was borne out by the trying years of the Civil War and the Great Patriotic War.The Soviet people, under the leadership of fhe Communist Party, performed an unparalleled feat of heroism by building, in wartime conditions, a powerful war industry which soon began to produce better arms than, those manufactured by Nazi Germany and its satellites, and in greater quantities.
The Soviet Communist Party and Government did a great deal of organisational work to move industrial facilities from the western areas of the country to the east where, hundreds of miles away from the battle front, new factories and plants were built. That was the most massive and the most effective evacuation ever undertaken in history. In the second half of 1941, 1,523 industrial enterprises were moved, in whole or in part, from the front-line zone to the east. These included 1,360 large factories and plants. At the same time, large stocks of grain and foodstuffs, a large number of farm machines, 2,393,300 head of cattle were evacuated.^^2^^ Already in the first half of 1942, more than 1,200 major industrial enterprises thus transferred from the west were put back into operation. To all intents and purposes a whole industrial country with a population of more than 10 million was moved thousands of kilometres to the east. And there, in what had hitherto been howling wilderness, the newly-brought machine-tools were put into operation as soon as they had been unloaded from railway platforms.
_-_-_^^1^^ Lenin V. I., "The Impending Catastrophe and How to Combat It'', Collected Works, Vol. 25, 1977, pp. 364--69.
~^^2^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol 4, p. 140.
176Western historians more often than not prefer to say nothing about the scale of the evacuation of industrial facilities to the eastern areas of the Soviet Union and the effect this unprecedented phenomenon had on the entire course of the war and its outcome. The silence is only occasionally broken by fairly objective assessments, like the one made by Klaus Reinhardt, the West German historian: "This relocation of the defence industry was something the Germans did not expect. It had a decisive effect on the plans of the German wartime industry which fell far short of its targets, for a considerable part of what it was expected to 'produce was to come directly from the occupied areas.''^^1^^
The war demonstrated the superiority of Soviet economic organisation. The socialist system ensured the fullest possible use of the economic potential of the nation for the war effort. The raw material resources, production capacities, the labour of workers and peasants were put to much better and effective use in the Soviet Union than in any capitalist country. Soviet scholar G. S. Kravchenko cites eloquent figures on the effectiveness of the socialist wartime economy. For example, for every million tons of steel smelted during the war in the Soviet Union, it manufactured 50 per cent more aircraft than Britain, 160 per cent more than Germany, and 220 per cent more than the United States; 200 per cent more tanks and self-propelled guns than Germany, 280 per cent more than Britain, 530 per cent more than the United States; 440 per cent more artillery pieces than Britain, 670 per cent more than the United States and over 300 per cent more than Germany.^^2^^
The devotion of the Soviet people, who gave unstintingly of their effort to achieve victory, and the purposeful organisational role of the Communist Party ensured appreciable achievements by the war industry. In spite of the tremendous odds and the shortage of material _-_-_
~^^1^^ Klaus Reinhardt, Die Wende vor Moskau..., S. 32.
^^2^^ G. S. Kravchenko, The Wartime Economy of the USSR 1941--1945. Moscow, 1963, p. 381 (in Russian).
177 resources and manpower, the Soviet Union rapidly increased the production of arms. At the end of 1942 the Nazi army lost the superiority it had earlier over the Soviet armed forces in the main types of weapons. Soviet plants gave the Soviet army weapons which helped it to crush the war machine of the Nazis, which had been drawing their strength from the industrial might of almost the whole of Europe. At the end of the war the Soviet armed forces had a more than three-fold superiority over the Wehrmacht in tanks and self-propelled guns, and an almost eight-fold superiority in aircraft.^^1^^ Over the years of the war the Soviet Union manufactured 112,100 aircraft, 102,800 tanks and self-propelled guns, 482,200 guns, 70 warships in all main classes.^^2^^Lenin said that "the country cannot be made capable of self-defence without the supreme heroism of the people in boldly and resolutely carrying out great economic transformations.''^^3^^ This idea of the founder of the Soviet state was borne out during the war.
The victory of the USSR in the military-economic confrontation with Germany was achieved by the superhuman effort of the Soviet people, by the hard and purposeful organisational work of the Communist Party. The watchword of the nation was "Everything for the battle front, everything for victory!''. The front and the rear were fused into one. The selfless labour of Soviet men and women and the gallant struggle of the Soviet troops combined in an unprecedented heroic feat of the Soviet people fighting for their socialist Motherland.
Thus the Soviet system proved not only the best form of organisation of the economic and cultural advance in the years of peaceful construction, but also the best form of mobilisation of all the forces of the nation for the struggle against the enemy in wartime. No other _-_-_
^^1^^ The USSR in the Struggle Against Nazi Aggression 7939--1945. Moscow, 1976, pp. 283, 284 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 12, 1982, p. 168.
~^^3^^ V. I. Lenin, "The Impending Catastrophe and How to Combat It'', Collected Works, Vol. 25, p. 363.
178 nation would have been able to withstand such trials as did the Soviet Union.The victory of the Soviet Union over Nazi Germany in the military and economic spheres is both significant and impressive. This is admitted by many Western historians who point out the key role of Soviet industry in routing the Third Reich.
``Magnitogorsk defeated the Ruhr" is the conclusion made even by those authors who are not at all sympathetic to the Soviet Union. In the period of the prewar five-year plans "the Soviet Union did indeed become industrialized, and did become able to defend itself, as World War II showed'',^^1^^ writes Horace Davis, an American historian. Earl Ziemke believes that "the Soviet bureaucracy proved itself capable of mobilizing manpower, industry, and agriculture for the war effort even under the tremendous handicap...''^^2^^
The book War. A Historical, Political and Social Study, published in the United States in 1978, points to the positive qualities of the Soviet economic system, such as its planned character, and the existence of the industrial centres in the Urals and Siberia built before the war, and says that "the Russian wartime economic achievement demonstrated tremendous ability to improvise and sacrifice'', that "Russia still managed to set and maintain high productive levels'', and to maintain agricultural production.^^3^^
Commenting on the Soviet economic performance during the war the French scholar Rene Girault writes: "The planning system introduced by the Soviet Government since the beginning of the era of five-year plans undoubtedly enabled it to site more evenly new factories in the Urals and in Siberia. It is just as incontestable that the evacuation of the main centres of production to the east was carried out due to the active participation of the masses of workers and peasants drawn into this _-_-_
~^^1^^ Horace B. Davis, Toward a Marxist Theory of Nationalism. Monthly Review Press, New York and London, 1978, p. 101.
~^^2^^ Earl F. Ziemke, Stalingrad to Berlin..., p. 501.
~^^3^^ War. A Historical, Political and Social Study. Edited by I. L. Farrar. ABC-Clio, Inc., Santa Barbara, etc. 1978, p. 175.
179 gigantic migration.''^^1^^ Girault points to the unity and heroic effort of those working on the home front for the sake of victory over the enemy. "The fact that the [Soviet. -Ed.} rear not only held out in 1941--1942 but supplied the battle front with arms,'' he writes, "was the result of the enormous physical and moral strain of the entire Soviet people organised by the Communist Party.... The impression was of a ship whose passengers, regardless of class of travel, left their cabins in stormy weather in order to join sailors, in the belief that it would take more than the crew alone to sail her to the shore."^^2^^However, such admissions of the advantages of the Soviet socialist economy occur very rarely in the works of Western historians. More often than not they merely state the fact that the Soviet industry produced a vast amount of materiel, without mentioning the specifics of the Soviet economic organisation or the sources of the heroic labour effort under the socialist system. Instead of making a scientific study of the phenomenon, some of the those historians refer to the economic victory of the USSR as ``inexplicable''.
At the same time reactionary historians do not shrink from any means of discrediting the socialist system and the economic foundations of the victory of the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War. They even do not stop short of inventions about the use of forced labour in the Soviet Union in the war years, or about the crucial importance of the lend-lease weapons, equipment and some strategic materials for the ultimate Soviet victory.
For three decades now reactionary historians and politologists have been arguing that the Soviet Union would _-_-_
^^1^^ Ren\'e Girault, L'effort humain de I'aniere (1941--1943). Revue d'histoire de la deuxieme guerre mondiale, octobre 1967, No. 68, p. 16.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 31.
180 not have been able to stand the pressure of the Nazi juggernaut and would have surely lost the war if it had not received the ``disinterested'' assistance in weapons and strategic materials from its western allies. These contentions fill the books and magazines of the capitalist countries of Western Europe and America, have infiltrated schpol textbooks and are spread in every way by the Western mass media.The conveyor belt loaded with inventions about the crucial effect of the U.S. economy on the course and outcome of the Second World War was set in motion back in the days of the war. American historians and propaganda-mongers picked up the words Roosevelt said prior to the entry of the United States into the war about the need to create the Arsenal of Democracy and inflated them into the myth that the United States had assured victory by creating a formidable wartime industry and did all it could to provide the Soviet Union with the means of warfare.
In the introduction to R. Buchanan's book The United States and World War II American historians Henry S. Commanger and Richard B. Morris made this high-handed statement: "But in the end it was the sheer weight of American production that turned the tide in the war-the American ability to produce enough bombers, ships, tanks, food and oil, for her own needs, and for the needs of Britain, Russia and even China.''^^1^^ Another American author, Quincy Howe is even more emphatic: "American technology, American resources, and American manpower had put the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition in position to impose unconditional surrender on all its enemies on all fronts."^^2^^
The book Great Events of the 20th Century, brought out by the Reader's Digest Association, claims that "although the U.S.A. entered the war late, most historians agree _-_-_
~^^1^^ R. Buchanan, The United States and World War II. Vol. 1, New York, 1964, p. XV.
~^^2^^ Quincy Howe, Ashes of Victory. World War II and Its Aftermath. Simon and Schuster, New York, 1972, p. 274.
181 that her contribution was decisive. Without her fighting men and without her overwhelming production of bombs, ships and planes, the Allies might well have been defeated.''^^1^^This highly exaggerated assessment of the role played by the American economy in the war years is typical not only of historians in the United States. The French historian Rene Remond insists that "the entry of the United States into the war laid its imprint on the nature of the conflict, turning it into an industrial war. The United States reconverted its economy and turned it into a tool that opened for it the way to Berlin."^^2^^
Those are ``global'' assessments of the role of the United States in the Second World War. Some Western authors consistently overrate the role of the American and British lend-lease assistance and go as far as to actually claim that the fate of the Soviet Union during the Great Patriotic War hinged on the United States which allegedly "saved Russia''.
The American historian Henry Pachter writes that without American and British assistance "the Soviet Union could not have turned the tide all by itself'.^^3^^ Pachter is echoed by L. Rose who says that the growing might of the Soviet army and the victories over the countries of the fascist bloc in the closing stages of the Great Patriotic War would have been impossible without "generous American lend-lease assistance".^^4^^ American author Robert Jones supports this version with a reference to General Marshall, Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, who said in March 1944 that if the United States had cut off _-_-_
^^1^^ Great Events of the 20th Century. How They Changed Our Lives, p. 287.
~^^2^^ Ren6 Remond, Introduction d I'histoire de la notre temps. Tome 3, Editions du Seuil, Paris, 1974, p. 167.
~^^3^^ Henry M. Pachter, The Fall and Rise of Europe. Praeger Publishers, New York, 1975, p. 256.
~^^4^^ Lisle A. Rose, Dubious Victory. The United States and the End of World War II. The Kent State University Press, Kent (Ohio), 1973, p. 6.
182 its lend-lease assistance the Nazis "could probably defeat" the USSR.^^1^^Professor Edgar Erickson of the University of Illinois writes in the introduction to Jones's book that "without the American help Russian resistance might have collapsed from want of food alone".^^2^^ In Albert Seaton's view, "without United States vehicles and railway equipment some of the great Soviet victories in Belorussia and the Ukraine would not have been possible".^^3^^
The idea of the crucial role of lend-lease in the Second World War is pushed not only in historical publications but also in school textbooks. One of them says, for example, that the Soviet troops could take up an offensive only after they had received "thousands of British tanks and American trucks".^^4^^ Therefore there is nothing surprising about the fact that the falsifiers of history not only ignore the facts and figures which show the real worth of lend-lease, but deliberately keep silent about the objective assessments of this assistance made by responsible U.S. officials at the time.
At the end of May 1945, when Harry Hopkins, President Roosevelt's personal representative, was in Moscow for talks, he said: "We had never believed that our LendLease help had been the chief factor in the Soviet defeat of Hitler on the eastern front. That had been done by the heroism and blood of the Russian Army."^^5^^ In his assessment of the Allied assistance to the Soviet _-_-_
~^^1^^ Robert Huhn Jones, The Roads to Russia. United States LendLeast to the Soviet Union. University of Oklahoma Press, Oklahoma, 1969, p. 175.'
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. IX.
~^^3^^ Albert Seaton, The Russo-German War 1941--1945. Arthur Barker Limited, London, 1971, p. 590.
~^^4^^ Henry W. Bragdon, Samuel P. McCutcher, History of a Free People. Macmillan, New York, 1978, pp. 675--676.
~^^5^^ Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins. An Intimate History. Crosset & Dunlop, New York, 1950, p. 897.
183 Union, the prominent British statesman Ernest Bevin said: "All the aid we have been able to give has been small compared with the tremendous efforts of the Soviet people. Our children's children will look back, through their history books, with admiration and thanks for the heroism of the great Russian people.''^^1^^ But today the American and British people are given a different interpretation of the events of that time.There is nothing accidental about the exaggeration of the part the U.S. wartime economy played in the Second World War, about how crucial the Anglo-American supplies of arms, materials and foodstuffs were to the victory of the Soviet Union over Nazi Germany. Ordinary readers are led to believe that capitalist America was strong and powerful and that socialist Russia was weak.
Soviet official documents and historical studies have never denied the importance of the Allied assistance to the Soviet Union. As pointed out in Soviet sources, the USSR received from the United States 14,700 aircraft, 7,000 tanks, about 400,000 vehicles, a certain amount of communication equipment, foodstuffs and other materials.^^2^^ The same sources point out that on the whole lend-lease amounted to only 4 per cent of Soviet wartime production. An itemised list of the U.S. deliveries shows that the number of aircraft brought in under lend-lease constituted 12 per cent of the total number of aircraft manufactured in the Soviet Union during the war, 10 per cent of armoured vehicles, 2 per cent of guns, 2.8 per cent of grain. In toto, the Soviet Union received about 10 billion dollars worth of wartime assistance, which is equivalent to only about one-third of all the American deliveries under the lend-lease programme to the countries of the antiHitler coalition, or 3.5 per cent of the total military expenditure of the United States.
The deliveries of materials and equipment to the Soviet _-_-_
^^1^^ Quoted from: Alexander Werth, Russia at War 1941--1945. Barrie and Rockliff, London, 1964, p. XIV.
~^^2^^ A History of the Socialist Economy of the USSR. Moscow, 1976, Vol. 5, p. 540 (in Russian).
184 Union were erratic. On July 18, 1942, on the second day after the Battle of Stalingrad began, Churchill informed the Soviet government that he had ordered a halt to aid deliveries by sea. In spite of the strong protest from Stalin, who referred to this move by the Allies as inadmissible at a time when Soviet armed resistance was stretched to breaking point, neither the United States nor Britain agreed to reconsider their earlier decision. What they did was to send two convoys-one in September and the other in December 1942. The next year the interval between the two convoys sent to the USSR was even longer: from April to November. As a result, Britain and the United States defaulted on half of their aid commitments.^^1^^At the same time Soviet industry, already in 1942, succeeded in sharply increasing the output of military equipment. Suffice it to say that in 1942 the Soviet war industry manufactured 25,436 aircraft, 24, 466 tanks, more than 158,000 guns and mortars, 15 warships.
Commenting on the significance of American lend-lease assistance, Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin wrote: "Deliveries of this size could not have possibly had any marked effect on the course of the war. What is more, the deliveries themselves were not always made on time when we needed certain types of equipment very badly. The tactical and technical characteristics of this equipment also left much to be desired. For it included many obsolescent tanks and aircraft which were inferior to Soviet models and which we could therefore use only for operations of secondary importance.''^^2^^
In some of their works on the Second World War Western historians give a true picture of the role and significance of lend-lease.
The authors of an illustrated history of the Second World War published by the Time and Life Corporation _-_-_
~^^1^^ A History of Diplomacy. Vol. 4, Moscow, 197(i, pp. 274--275 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Kommunist, 1980, No. 7, p. 51.
185 for sale in European countries gave the following assessment of the role of the lend-lease deliveries in the grimmest period of the war for the Soviet Union: "In the winter of 1941--1942, the first deliveries arrived too late to be of any help to the Red Army during its struggle to save the Soviet Union. In those critical days it was the Russians, and they alone, who bore the brunt of the German aggression with whatever means they themselves had, and on their own land, without any great help from the Western democracies.''^^1^^The British historian Alan Clark drew the following conclusions: "It does seem that the Russians could have won the war on their own, or at least fought the Germans to a standstill,' without any help from the West. Such relief as they derived from our participation ... was marginal, not critical".^^2^^
But such assessments literally drown in the murky torrent of lies about the ``altruism'' and ``nobleness'' of the American ruling quarters which allegedly hastened to the aid of the Soviet Union.
It must be emphasised in the first place that the United States administration regarded the Soviet Union as an indispensable ally in the struggle against Nazi Germany, which, having reached a military and political agreement with Japan and Italy, and having seized almost all the countries of Europe, turned into a dangerous enemy threatening the independence of America itself. Nevertheless, there were powerful forces at work inside the USA which spoke against assistance to the Soviet Union. The American historian Robert Divine points out that, biased as they were, these men acted out of purely political motives.^^3^^ However, President Roosevelt and many of his close associates believed, and quite rightly so, that American assistance to the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Le front russe. Par Nicholas Bethell et les redacteurs des editions Time-Life. Time-Life International (Nederland), 1980, p. 145.
~^^2^^ Alan Clark, Barbarossa. The Russian-German Conflict 1941--1945. Hutchinson & Co., Ltd, London, 1965, p. XIX.
~^^3^^ Robert A. Divine, Roosevelt and World War II. Penguin Books Inc., Baltimore, 1972, pp. 83--84.
186 Soviet Union primarily served the interests of the USA itself.In June 1941, Harry Hopkins, assistant to the President, ordered that a special memorandum be drafted, called Three Paragraphs on the Russian Situation. It pointed out that:
1. Hitler regarded Russia as his main and the most dangerous enemy, and as the main obstacle to his plans for world dominatioa
2. Russia, locked as she was in combat with the Reich, was wearing down the aggressor, depriving him of his manpower resources and shattering his hopes for enslaving the world.
3. The practical considerations that the United States had to follow in that situation were clear; it was in U.S. interests to send assistance to the Soviet Union (whether the USA liked some of the aspects of Russia's domestic and foreign policy or not).^^1^^
The plans of the Nazis for world domination and the plans of Japan for unchallenged dominance in Asia and the Pacific threatened the interests of American monopoly capital. Therefore the main task of the ruling quarters in the United States was to foil these plans. In the conditions of the Second World War this task could be resolved only by military means.
On June 23, 1941, the day after the Nazi Reich attacked the Soviet Union, Under-Secretary of State Summer Welles said that "Hitler's armies are today the chief danger of the Americans".^^2^^ On August 6, 1941, The New York Times made no bones about the position of the American policy-makers: "...It must be clear that our primary interest is not in 'helping Russia' but in _-_-_
~^^1^^ See: V. L. Malkov, "Harry Hopkins: Pages from a Political Biography''. Novaya i noveishaya istoriya, 1979, No. 3, p. 119.
~^^2^^ The New York Times, June 24, 1941, p. 7.
187 `stopping Hitler'.'' M. Arnold-Forster writes: "The Russian winter offensive of 1941, besides gaining ground, restored the Allies' morale as nothing else could have done. It was a time when good news was scarce. The Japanese, apparently invincible, had destroyed most of the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor and were sweeping through South-East Asia. Only Russians seemed to be prevailing.... In a dark hour the Russians' confidence spread comfortingly to other Allies.''^^1^^ All these statements and documents clearly show that the United States needed the Soviet Union as an ally in the war against Nazi Germany, and it was these realistic considerations that prompted the Roosevelt Administration to render assistance to the USSR under its lend-lease programme, which, as American leaders believed, could help the United States to achieve its military and strategic goals.The French historian Maxime Mourin writes that according to the U.S. military and political philosophy the enemy was to be routed at the time "when the USSR was holding most of the Wehrmacht on its fronts".^^2^^ Moreover, certain quarters in the United States were inclined to taper off direct American participation in the struggle against the fascist-militarist bloc in the main land theatre of the war. In his memoirs Averell Harriman writes that President Roosevelt "hoped that if we [USA] could help the Russians continue to fight, the Red Army would be able to keep the Axis armies engaged, and by using our air and sea power we could avoid committing major ground forces on the continent of Europe".^^3^^
Until the summer of 1943, the United States did very little fighting, if any, on the European continent, except for bombing raids. When finally the Allies opened the Second Front in France, following a long period of indecision and procrastination, the American political and military leaders undoubtedly saw that Nazi Germany would _-_-_
~^^1^^ M. Arnold-Forster. The World at War. Thames Metheum, London, 1983. p. IfiO.
~^^2^^ Maxime Mourin, Reddition sans conditions. Editions Albin Michel, Paris,, 1973, p. 46.
~^^3^^ W. Averell Harriman, America and Russia in a Changing World. Doubleday & Company, Inc., New York, 1971, p. 15.
188 not be able to put up strong resistance to the armies of the United States and Britain, because its forces were tied up in Russia. This fact is specifically pointed out in the documents from General Eisenhower's personal archives made public in 1970. The Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Forces in Europe believed that the American deliveries to the USSR had strengthened the combat efficiency of the Soviet troops and in this way forced Germany to expend its main forces on the Eastern front.~^^1^^The ruling quarters of the United States were in an excellent position to build up its military and industrial potential. The country had vast sources of energy and raw materials, a powerful industry, manpower. Another important factor was that the United States was a long distance away from the theatres of war. The official "Summary of War Production in the United States 1940--1945" reads: "The initiative possessed by the Axis in the first stages of the war was first wrested from them by the Russians during the winter of 1941--1942 and decisively in the fall of 1942- The effect of these events on our war production efforts was to give us more time and to reduce the potential overall magnitude of our military task in the European theatre."^^2^^
George Marshall, Chief of Staff of U.S. Army, wrote in an official report on the results of the war: "The element on which the security of this nation most depended was time.... We were given this time through the heroic refusal of the Soviet and British peoples to collapse under the smashing blows of the Axis force. They bought this time for us with the currency of blood and courage.''^^3^^
The American historian George Herring also refutes the allegation that the United States Was acting out of purely altruistic motives in extending assistance to its Allies. He writes: "Lend-lease was not ... the most unsordid _-_-_
~^^1^^ See: The Public Papers of Dwight D. Eisenhower. The War Years. Vols. I-V, Government Printing Office, Baltimore, 1970.
~^^2^^ Summary of War Production in the United States 1940--1945, p. 2.
~^^3^^ The War Reports of General of the Army George C. Marshall, General of the Army H. H. Arnold, Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King. J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia-New York, 1977, p. 153.
189 act in the history of any nation. It was an act of calculated self-interest and Americans were ever conscious of the advantages that might be secured from it.''^^1^^In his memoirs U.S. ex-President Harry Truman unwittingly exploded the myth about the ``unselfish'' American assistance to the Allies during the war. "The money spent for Lend-Lease unquestionably meant the saving of a great many American lives. Every soldier of Russia, England, and Australia who had been equipped by Lend-Lease means to go into that war reduced by that much the dangers that faced our young men in the winning of it."^^2^^ Significantly, in the years of the war the United States received from the Soviet Union, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, 300,000 tons of chromium ore and 32,000 tons of manganese ore, a considerable amount of platinum, fur, and other materials and finished products.
In his two-volume La seconde guerre mondiale brought out in a large edition by Larousse, the French historian Raymond Cartier writes: "An important element that helped change the balance on the Eastern front was American aid. There is no use looking for the slightest reference to that in Soviet publications. However, the stream of goods, the river of plenty that inundated Russia beginning from 1941 defies the imagination.''^^3^^
An American history textbook published in 1978 says that American help during the war was later "carefully disguised on Stalin's orders".^^4^^ The idea is very simple: to have schoolchildren grow up with the belief that the Russians are an "ungrateful lot''.
Soviet history books have never ignored or underestimated the importance of American and British wartime assistance to the Soviet Union. At the same time they _-_-_
~^^1^^ George C. Herrihg, Jr. Aid to Russia 1941--1946. Columbia University Press, New York and London, 1973, p. 293.
~^^2^^ Harry S. Truman, Memoirs. Volume I. Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, etc., 1955, p. 234.
~^^3^^ Raymond Cartier, La seconde guerre mondiale. t. 2, Larousse, Paris, 1968, p. (i
~^^4^^ Marvin Perry. Man's Unfinished Journey. A World History. Houghton Mitflin Company, Boston, 1978, p. 723.
190 seek to give a correct, fair and balanced assessment of this aid. In his memoirs Marshal Zhukov calls attention to the way the lend-lease issue was interpreted in different countries. "It is true that in the war years the Soviet Union received important deliveries for its national economy, such as machines and equipment, materials of various kinds, fuel and foodstuffs. For example the United States and Britain shipped to us more than 400,000 vehicles, a large number of steam locomotives, and communication equipment. But how could all that have had the decisive effect on the progress of the war?''^^1^^ Marshal Zhukov cites some figures on the delivery of weapons under the lend-lease commitments.There is still another episode in lend-lease lore. In the summer of 1945, President Truman ordered a halt to all further deliveries to the Soviet Union. This unilateral action on the part of the United States had nothing in common with the end of the war in Europe, but was clearly the result of the "new approach" of the American administration to the question of economic assistance to the Soviet Union, which was badly in need of credits and industrial plant from the United States for the restoration of the war-ravaged national economy. The destruction wrought by the Nazis in the Soviet Union was appalling: 1,710 towns and more than 70,000 villages destroyed, more than six million buildings ruined or burnt, about 25 million people left homeless, 31,850 industrial enterprises, 65,000 kilometres of railways and 4,100 railway stations wrecked, 98,000 collective farms, 1,876 state farms and 2,890 machine-and-tractor stations ruined and looted. The direct damage the Soviet Union sustained in the temporarily occupied areas was estimated at 679 billion roubles. The overall damage, including the military expenditures and the lost revenues for the national economy in the occupied areas reached the staggering total of 2 trillion 569 billion roubles.^^2^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ G. K. Zhukov, Recollections and Reminiscences. Vol. 2, pp. 372--373.
~^^2^^ A History of the Foreign Policy of the USSR 1917--1945. Vol. I, Moscow, 1976, p. 479 (in Russian).
191As for the United States it not only did not lose, but even gained in the war. It would seem that the United States was best equipped to help the Soviet Union as its ally to restore the national economy, all the more so since the Soviet Union was not asking for charity or gratuitous assistance, but for long-term government credits on the basis of agreements, also for the placing of Soviet orders for industrial equipment in the United States. However, the U.S. administration decided to take advantage of what it thought was the ``weakness'' of the Soviet Union and to force it abandon its independent policies in the international arena. In September 1945, Moscow was visited by an American delegation headed by William Colmer, Chairman of the Special Committee for Post-war Economic Policy and Planning. John Lewis Gaddis writes: ,,Colmer and his colleagues demanded that, in return for an American loan, the Soviet Union reform its internal system of government and abandon the sphere of influence it had so carefully constructed in Eastern Europe.''^^1^^
The American historian Lisle A. Rose, an e^qaert in postwar international relations, writes that "in the spring of 1945 a number of American officials, most notably Averell Harriman and Assistant Secretary of State for Economic Affairs William L. Clayton, did strongly urge the withholding of postwar credits from the Soviet Union until the Kremlin improved its conduct".^^2^^ However, the Soviet Union was not to be dictated to or blackmailed.
Thus there was no question of American ``altruism'' on the matter of lend-lease, just as there is no question of the American lend-lease deliveries being a ``decisive'' factor at any time in the Great Patriotic War and least of all in the Soviet victory that ended the war.
In late 1941, the worst days of the war, the Soviet army committed 670 tanks in the Battle of Moscow. But _-_-_
^^1^^ John Lewis Gaddis, The United States and the Origins of the Cold War 1941--1947. Columbia University Press, New York and London, 1972, p. 260.
~^^2^^ Lisle A. Rose, Dubious Victory, p. 64.
192 in the Battle of Berlin in 1945 the Soviet army had more than 6,000 tanks and self-propelled guns, 41,600 guns and 7,500 aircraft. All these weapons were of Soviet make. The implacable logic of history puts everything in its place. __ALPHA_LVL2__ THE POLITICAL FACTORThe victory of the Soviet Union in the war demonstrated not only the advantages of the socialist economy, but also the strength of the Soviet state and its social system, the inviolable friendship of all the big and small nations of our country, the unity of Soviet people around the Communist Party, the great force of the communist ideas. Lenin wrote: "All wars are inseparable from the political systems that engender them.''^^1^^ He also pointed out that the course of a war and its outcome depend primarily "upon the internal regime of the country that goes to war".^^2^^
Long before it attacked the Soviet Union the Nazi Reich put its reliance not only in brute force but also in what it thought was the weakness of the state and social system of the Soviet Union. Goebbels and his underlings at the propaganda ministry went to great lengths trying to prove the existence of "vulnerable spots" in the Soviet system and to give ideological support to the adventuristic idea of the Blitzkrieg. The Nazi aggressors hoped that the multinational Soviet state would fall to pieces under the blows the Wehrmacht.
History taught a severe lesson to those who hoped to defeat the Soviet Union, to those who did not see, or did not want to see, the indestructible potential, the viability of the socialist system born of the Great October Socialist Revolution.
_-_-_^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "War and Revolution'', Collected Works, Vol. 24, 1974, p. 400.
~^^2^^ V. I. Lenin, "2nd Congress of Communist Organisations of the East. Address to the Second All-Russia Congress of Communist Organisations of the Peoples of the East, November 22, 1919," Collected Works, Vol. 30, 1977, p. 152.
__PRINTERS_P_193_COMMENT__ 1/2 12--682 193Western writers often refer to the patriotism of the Soviet people as rooted in the "unfathomable Russian character'', in that "mysterious Russian soul'', sa/ing for example, that it was not Soviet patriotism, but love for "Mother Russia" that enabled the Soviet Union to go through the ordeal of war. Gustav Welter (France) traces Soviet patriotism back to the times "when the Russian people had implicit faith in their leaders, be it Peter the Great, Kutuzov or Stalin''.^^1^^
The above interpretation of Soviet patriotism deprives it of class content and reduces it to a narrow national concept. Hence the conclusion that communist ideology did not sufficiently influence the consciousness of Soviet people, which led the Communist Party to sing the praises of "Holy Russia''. In support of these allegations they cite such facts as the conferring of the title of ``Guards'' upon some Soviet Army units (Guards divisions, Guards regiments, etc.), the institution of government awards named after celebrated generals and admirals of the past: Alexander Suvorov, Mikhail Kutuzov, Bogdan Khmelnitsky, Pavel Nakhimov, Fyodor Ushakov, Alexander Nevsky. This line of reasoning is manifest in the works of Georg von Rauch (FRG), Holene Carrere d'Encausse (France) and others.^^2^^
That is what can be said on that score. Every nation has gone through crucial periods when it had to fight for its independence, when it faced social changes that had a far-reaching effect on its political life as a state. Such crucial periods brought forth progressive political and military leaders whose activity had a positive effect on social development. Alexander Nevsky is alive in the memory of the people not because he was a prince, but because he headed the struggle of his people against _-_-_
^^1^^ Gustav Welter, Histoire de Russie. Payot, Paris, 1963, p. 409.
~^^2^^ Georg von Rauch, Geschichte der Sowjetunion. Alfred Kroner Verlag, Stuttgart, 1969; Helene Carrere d'Encausse, L'empire eclate. Le revolU des nations en URSS. Flammarion, Paris, 1978.
194 foreign invaders for the independence of Old Rus. The Soviet people honour the memory of Suvorov, Kutuzov, Ushakov and Nakhimov not because of titles and promotions they received from the tsars, but because they, a^ the progressive representatives of their time, understood the needs of the people and of the state and honestly served their country as talented commanders. Another progressive political leader and general was Bogdan Khmelnitsky who was one of the first representatives of his class to understand the unity of interests of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples.In its ideological work to educate Soviet people in the spirit of patriotism the Communist Party of the Soviet Union has always turned to the glorious past and to the traditions of the peoples of the Soviet Union born of the centuries of struggle for freedom and independence. At the same time the Communist Party has always maintained that historical research should be carried on from clearly-stated class positions, that the glorious past of the Russian people must not be identified with the history of the bourgeois-landowner system of tsarist Russia which for a long time was a "prison of the peoples''.^^1^^
The institution of the honorary title of Guards does not hark back to tsarist traditions either. Bourgeois historians deliberately ignore the fact that certain traditional concepts and notions may change in the language of any nation as time goes by. One such traditional notion is the word ``Guards'', which in modern Russian denotes troops that are best trained and have a strong revolutionary spirit and are devoted to the cause of communism. Not accidentally, the first detachments of the armed workers who fought against tsarism were called the Red Guards who in later years formed the backbone of the armed forces of the proletariat prior and during the Great October Socialist Revolution and in the early stages of _-_-_
^^1^^ A History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Vol. 5, Book, 1, p. 401 (in Russian).
__PRINTERS_P_195_COMMENT__ 1/2 12* 195 the Civil War (1918--1920).^^1^^ In Soviet publicistic writing and fiction such concepts as the Lenin Guards and the Guards of the Revolution took root long before the war. During the war the Guards title was conferred upon the best army formations and warships which had distinguished themselves in battle against the Nazi invaders.Western historians have put into circulation the malicious invention that the "communist regime in Russia" revised its attitude to the church during the war and actually "made peace" with and secured the support of the church it had allegedly persecuted. These falsifiers are trying to cash in on the prevalent ignorance in the West of the specific relations that exist between the socialist state and religious organisations, including the Russian Orthodox Church. The church was separated from the state in 1918 by a decree of the Council of People's Commissars. Identity with any religious creed is the personal matter of every citizen of the USSR. The Constitution of the USSR guarantees freedom of worship for all citizens. In the early years of Soviet rule many clergymen who had connections with the exploiter classes in tsarist Russia and tried to block socialist change were prosecuted. Our country was surging ahead on the road of social and economic progress, and the working people, including some who went to church, took an active part in building a new life. If the church had stood apart from the mainstream of social change and ignored the loyalty of the believers to the new sociopolitical system, it would have lost its influence with this part of the population. This is why it openly renounced all anti-Soviet activities.
Back in 1927, Metropolitan Sergius, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, called upon the clergy and all religious people to give their active support to the Soviet government. In the years preceding the war the church held a loyal position with regard to the social and state system in the USSR.
_-_-_~^^1^^ For more on the subject see: A Soviet Military Encyclopaedia, Vol. 2, Moscow, 1976, pp. 496--498 (in Russian).
196After the Nazi aggressors attacked the Soviet Union, the entire Soviet nation, including religious people, rose in defence of their country. The church condemned the fascist aggression. When a national fund-raising and aid programme for the Soviet army was launched, the church took an active part. The money collected by believers was used to build a tank column which bore the name of Dmitry Donskoi.
At the same time, while respecting believers' religious feelings, the state and party bodies of the USSR never departed from the principle of separation of church from state. Neither the Orthodox Christian faith, nor any of its denominations, or any other religions, were admitted to participation in running the state. The Communist Party has always considered it its duty to disseminate the ideas of Marxist materialism and scientific atheism.
All this goes to show that no substantive change took place in relations between church and state during the war. The influence of the Orthodox Christian and other religions on the population was a far cry from what bourgeois historians claim it was and could not serve as a source of inspiration in the struggle against the enemy.
The falsifiers of history are using still another ploy in looking for the roots of Soviet patriotism. They allege that the popular struggle against the invaders was triggered off by the ``erroneous'' occupation policy of the fascist leaders. In the 1960s arguments of this sort appeared in books by the British historian Edgar O'Ballance and Alan Clark, the American historian Trumbull Higgins, the West German historian E.Hess, and others. Following this line, French sociologist Raymond Aron said that Russia's patriotic war against the Nazis was the result of the ``mistakes'' of the German occupation authorities.^^1^^ He is echoed by Klaus Reinhardt who tries to explain the heroic struggle of the Soviet people on the front of war and on the home _-_-_
^^1^^ Raymond Aron, Penser la guerre, Clauseuritz. Tome 2, Editions Gallimard. Paris, 1976, pp. 90--91.
__PRINTERS_P_197_COMMENT__ 11--682 197 front by the ``errors'' of the leaders pf the Third Reich in their policy for the population of the occupied areas and for the Soviet prisoners of war. At the same time Reinhardt is trying to justify the criminal orders and actions of the Wehrmacht command which allegedly ``censured'' this policy, blaming the SS for it.^^1^^ Carrere d'Encausse, whose works exude anti-Communism and anti-Sovietism, thinks that the leaders of Nazi Germany could have played "the nationalities card" which would have weakened the USSR. According to her, if the plan proposed by the war criminal Alfred Rosenberg had been put through and the Soviet Union had been dismembered, "the Soviet federation would have been doomed".^^2^^All those disquisitions about the possibility of the Nazis adopting some sort of ``humane'' policy for the Soviet population, and the ``effectiveness'' of such a policy are all the more impermissible since they are clearly aimed at whitewashing German imperialism and nazism and giving the brutal regime a "human face''. It may be well to recall here that long before the war the Nazi leaders put forward in numerous documents a programme for conquering territories in Eastern Europe and set forth monstrous plans for exterminating Slavic peoples and for Germanising some groups of the population which the invaders intended to turn into their slaves. Hitler declared cynically: "Our guiding principle is that these [Slavic] peoples have the only justification for their existence: to be economically useful to us.''^^3^^ The master plan Ost worked out with the participation of Himmler and Rosenberg in May 1540, provided for the destruction of 30 million Slavs. The section of this document dealing with the Soviet Union reads: "The idea is not merely to destroy the Russian state with Moscow as its centre, but rather to smash the Russian people as a nation, to dissociate them.''^^4^^ The Nazis were planning to destroy the Soviet intelligentsia on all occupied territory, to abolish _-_-_
~^^1^^ Klaus Reinhardt, Die Wende vor Moskau, S. 90--91.
~^^2^^ Helene Carrere d'Encausse, L 'empire eclate, pp. 29, 30.
^^3^^ Hitlers Tischgesprache in Fithrerhauptquartier 1941--1942. Hrsg. von H. Picker, Stuttgart, 1963, S. 270.
~^^4^^ Vierteljahrshefte fur Zeitgeschichte. 3. Heft, Juli 19.58, Stuttgart, S. 313.
198 higher and secondary education, to turn Soviet people into dumb slaves.Shortly before the outbreak of the war a special letter of instruction was circulated in Germany as to the behaviour of Nazi officials on the occupied territory of the Soviet Union. It read: "You must make it quite clear that you are here to represent great Germany for centuries to come... Therefore you must-with honour and dignity-carry through the most harsh and ruthless measures that the Vaterland will require of you.''^^1^^
The German military unhesitatingly put into practice the racist, misanthropic theories, using brute force and the worst kind of savagtiy against the population of the occupied areas. Under the directive "On Military Jurisdiction in the Barbarossa Area and on the Special Powers of the Troops" issued on May 13, 1941, the Wehrmacht soldiers were given full license "to use violence against partisans and all suspected persons'', also against populated centres. They were absolved a priori of any responsibility for acts of tyranny and brutality against Soviet people.^^2^^
The OKW order July 22, 1941, instructed the occupation authorities to use "such terror as is likely, by its mere existence, to crush every will to resist amongst the population".^^3^^
An order issued by Walther von Reichenau, Commander of the 6th Army, "Conduct of Troops in Eastern Territories" read: "The troops should be interested in extinguishing fires only as far as it is necessary to secure sufficient numbers of billets. Otherwise, the disappearance of symbols of the former Bolshevistic rule, even in the form of buildings, is part of the struggle of destruction. Neither historic nor artistic considerations are of any importance in the Eastern Territories.''^^4^^
_-_-_^^1^^ The Criminal Means to Achieve Criminal Aiams. Documents about the occupation policy of Nazi Germany on the territory of the USSR (1941--1945), Moscow, 1963, p. 32 (in Russian).
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 31.
^^3^^ Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal. Vol. XXII, Published at Nuremberg, Germany, 1948, p. 287.
~^^4^^ Ibid., Vol. IV, 1947, p. 460.
__PRINTERS_P_199_COMMENT__ 11* 199 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1984/WWII279/20070928/272.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2007.10.04) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+It stands to reason that the Nazi policy of terror in the occupied areas of the Soviet Union served to stoke the flames of the popular struggle against the Nazis. The outstanding Soviet statesman Mikhail Kalinin wrote back in the war days: "The cruelty which makes even cold stones cry out for revenge has caused even the most peaceful people to throw themselves into the selfless struggle against Hitler's criminals. And yet, the violence and brutality perpetrated by the German invaders against the civilian population are only accessory factors in the spread of the partisan war. The main wellsprings that so abundantly supply the partisan movement lie much deeper-in the midst of the people themselves.''^^1^^
The war fought by Germany and her satellites against the Soviet Union was both aggressive and criminal.
The Central Committee of the Communist Party and the Soviet Government laid bare the designs of the German aggressor at the very outset of the war. "The aim of the Nazi attack is to destroy the Soviet system, to seize the Soviet land, to enslave the Soviet Union and to plunder our country,''^^2^^ read the directive of the Central Committee of the Party and the Government of June 29, 1941.
The Party called upon all its countrymen to fight selflessly against the invaders, to defend every inch of their native soil, to fight to the last drop of blood for their towns and villages. At the call of the Party the whole nation rose in struggle against the invaders. Millions of Soviet^ people, right from the very first hours of the war showed an unbending will in the fight against the enemy, a dignity of spirit, and devotion to their duty as citizens of their socialist Motherland.
_-_-_^^1^^ M. I. Kalinin, On Communist Education and on Martial Duff. Moscow, 1967, p. 66 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ CPSU in the Resolutions and Decisions of its Congresses, Conferences and CC Plenary Meetings. Vol. 6, Moscow, 1971, p. 19 (to Russian).
200The main source of patriotism and self-sacrifice of Soviet citizens in the struggle against the invaders was the Soviet social and state system, the ideals of communism. When we speak about heroism in the Great Patriotic War we think of it not only in terms of personal bravery; we know it was unprecedented heroism on the part of the entire nation. During the war seven million Soviet soldiers were awarded government decorations, more than 11,000 men and women won the highest distinction, the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The mass heroism of the Soviet people was proof of their patriotism, love for their land, and boundless loyalty to the socialist system.
Reactionary historians never let up on their attempts to detract from the Soviet army's heroism, to distort the facts relating to the Soviet people's struggle for their socialist Motherland. Hanson Baldwin, for one, puts forward this ``insight'' explanation: "...The muzhik feared the iron discipline of the commissars, and the Soviet execution squads.''^^1^^ Here is a scene shamelessly penned by the earlier mentioned American historian William Craig: "...The colonel moved purposefully to the long lines of massed soldiers. A pistol in his right hand, he turned at the end of the first row and began counting in a loud voice: 'One, two, three, four.' As he reached the tenth man, he wheeled and shot him in the head. As the victim crumpled to the ground, the colonel picked up the count again: 'One, two, three...' At ten he shot another man dead and continued his dreadful monologue: 'One, two..."^^2^^ Reactionary historians and anti-Soviet propaganda-mongers have no scruples about using such crude fabrications to brainwash the uninitiated and poorly informed reader.
Baldwin, Craig and others of their ilk pass over in silence the assessments of those who learned to know the Soviet soldiers on battlefield. "The Soviet soldier was fighting for his political ideals consciously and fanatically. This applies particularly to younger soldiers,'' wrote Hans _-_-_
~^^1^^ Hanson Baldwin, Battles Lost and Won. Great Campaigns of World War 77, p. 168.
~^^2^^ William Craig, Enemy at the Gates. The Battle for Stalingrad, p. 72.
201 Friessner, a former Nazi general.^^1^^ After visiting Stalingrad with a group of war veterans from France, General Fernand Gambiez commented on the watchword of Stalingrad defenders-No land for us beyond the Volga!-in these words: "For us this watchword brings home the meaning of the patriotic education of the Red Army men, the love of Soviet people for their much-suffering country, the high morale of the masses.''^^2^^Back in 1919 Lenin spoke about the invincibility of socialism in its confrontation with the exploiter states: "A nation in which the majority of the workers and peasants realise, feel and see that they are fighting for their own Soviet power, for the rule of the working people, for the cause whose victory will ensure them and their children all the benefits of culture, of all that has been created by human labour-such a nation can never be vanquished.''^^3^^
Most of the defenders of the Socialist Motherland in the Great Patriotic War were the sons and daughters of those whom Lenin and the Communist Party led to victory in the socialist revolution in November 1917. They belonged to the generation of people who studied and worked in the years of the tremendous socio-economic transformations in the country, who built a socialist society and for whom the socialist way of life was a reality.
``Lenin's behests and his principles underlying the policy in the nationalities question are sacred to us. Relying on and steadfastly asserting them in practice we have created a powerful state, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, whose formation was not only a major step in the development of socialism but also a crucial turning point in world history,"^^4^^ _-_-_
^^1^^ Hans Friessner, Verratene Schlachten. Holsten-Verlag, Hamburg, 1956, S. 242.
~^^2^^ Le Figaro, 1972, August 28, p. 16
~^^3^^V. I. Lenin, "Speech at a Meeting of Railwaymen'', Collected Works, Vol. 29, 1977, p. 319.
^^4^^ Y. V. Andropov, Sixtieth Anniversary of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, Moscow, 1983, pp. 10--11.
202 said Yuri Andropov, General Secretary of theCentral Committee of the CPSU, in a speech at the meeting in the Kremlin devoted to the 60th anniversary of the formation of the USSR. The war years particularly bear out the truth of these words. The war brought still closer together all the big and small nations of our vast country. The defence of the socialist Motherland was the common cause of all Soviet citizens whatever their nationality. Fighting shoulder to shoulder were representatives of big and small nations of our country and their heroic exploits were a source of pride for all Soviet people.Two hundred rifle divisions with a total strength of one million that fought in 1944 were 58.3 per cent Russian, 22.3 per cent Ukrainian, 2.7 per cent Byelorussian, 2.0 per cent Uzbek, 1.5 per cent Kazakh, 1.5 per cent Azerbaijanian, 1.4 per cent Armenian, 1.0 per cent Kirghiz, and the rest-other nationalities of the USSR. One Estonian army corps, three Kazakh divisions, one Latvian, one Lithuanian, one Azerbaijanian, one Georgian, one Armenian, and one Bashkir divisions and smaller army units of the other nationalities were formed during the war.^^1^^ The defence of the socialist Motherland was the common cause of all the peoples of our country.
Speaking at a Soviet youth meeting in September 1941, the son of the Spanish revolutionary, Dolores Ib&rruri, Captain Rub6n Ruiz Ibarruri, who later died in the Battle of Stalingrad, said: "I am Spanish, and fighting next to me is a Russian and a Georgian, a Byelorussian and a Kazakh, a Ukrainian and a Tajik. Come and join us, all of you who want to win happiness and freedom for yourselves.'' The feelings voiced by a Soviet officer, Spanish by nationality, were close to all Soviet people for whom the class solidarity of the working men and women of all countries, the unity of the multinational family of the peoples of the USSR had become part of their life and the social framework which had taken shape in the course of the socialist reconstruction of the country.
The insinuations of the neofascist historians like Joachim _-_-_
~^^1^^ A Soviet Military Encyclopaedia. Vol. 3, 1977, p. 565 (in Russian).
203 Hoffmann, who is in the pay of the Bundeswehr's Military History Department, Wielfried Strik-Strikfeldt, and others who try to prove that in the years of the war the nationalities policy of the Soviet government "did not pass muster'', will not lead to anything.The hopes of the Nazi leaders and of world imperialism for the resurgence of old feuds between different nationalities and for the disintegration of the multinational socialist state were built on sand. The unity and friendship of all nations of the Soviet Union-big and small-stood up to the severest of tests.
The strength of the Soviet multinational state in the years of the Second World War has been noted by many Western historians saying that the fascist policy-makers and strategists were labouring under a delusion when they tried to foment non-existent dissensions between nationalities in the USSR. "That was a good lesson for the anticommunists of the whole world who, when the war broke out, placed their hopes now on a soldiers' mutiny, now on a peasant uprising, now on the disintegration of the Union of Soviet Republics.''^^1^^
The deep patriotic feelings of Soviet citizens were demonstrated in their struggle on occupied territory. Even in conditions of brutal terror, at the risk of their lives, the overwhelming majority of Soviet citizens in the occupied areas did not succumb to the invaders; they did all they could to sabotage the economic and political actions of the occupation authorities. Tens of thousands of them went underground, and hundreds of thousands fought as partisans.
Altogether 6,200 partisan detachments and underground groups, involving more than one million people fought in the enemy rear in the occupied areas of the Russian Federation, the Ukraine, Byelorussia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Moldavia. By the beginning of 1944, more than 30 per cent of the partisans were industrial workers, 41 per cent collective _-_-_
^^1^^ Gustav Welter, Histoire de Russie, pp. 408--409.
204 farmers, and about 29 per cent were office employees. Almost ten per cent of the partisans were women. Fighting in the partisan detachments were people of all nationalities of the Soviet Union.^^1^^The resistance fighters inflicted heavy losses upon the invaders. According to far from complete reports, the Soviet resistance fighters derailed more than 21,000 troop trains and trains carrying materiel, destroyed or damaged 1,618 locomotives and 170,800 railway carriages, blew up and burned 12,000 railway and highway bridges, killed or took prisoner about 1,500,000 Nazi officers and men and their servitors, and supplied the Soviet army with a great deal of valuable information.^^2^^
In some regions the resistance fighters kept large areas clear of the enemy and maintained Soviet power. There were large zones controlled by the freedom-fighters where the Nazis never set foot. In the summer of 1943, a total of more than 200,000 square kilometres of Soviet territory were under partisan control.
The partisan movement was of great political significance. By handing out leaflets and underground newspapers and by making personal contact with Soviet people on occupied territory, partisans and underground Party organisations passed on truthful information about the situation on the Soviet-German front, exposed the lies and slander of the occupation authorities, and nurtured in people the belief that the enemy would soon be routed and that they would soon be freed from the Nazi yoke. Both in scope and in the actual political and military results, the heroic struggle of Soviet people on the temporarily occupied territory became an important factor in the defeat of the Nazis.
In some of their works Western historians give fairly realistic assessments of the struggle of Soviet people in the enemy rear. The British historian Ralph White writes that "Soviet resistance quickly emerged ... committed to the _-_-_
~^^1^^ A Soviet Military Encyclopaedia. Vol. 6, 1978, p. 231.
~^^2^^ P. K. Ponomarenko, The Unvanquished. (The people's struggle in the enemy rear during the Great Patriotic War.) Moscow, 1975, pp. 55, 47 (in Russian).
205 most directly military forms of organization and activity, under central direction from Moscow and with its strategy closely aligned with that of the main Soviet forces'', and became a realistic major force in the struggle against Germany.^^1^^ This view was influenced in a way by Wehrrnacht generals who took part in military operations on the SovietGerman front, and by the official documents of the Nazi command. Lothar Rendulic, an ex-Nazi general, wrote: "The history of wars knows no other example of a partisan movement playing such an important role as it played in the last world war.... For the colossal impact it had on the conduct of warfare and on the problems of supply, the management of the rear and the administration of affairs in the occupied areas, the partisan movement became part of the broader concept of total war.... The partisan movement ... had a marked effect on the entire course of the Second World War.''^^2^^On July 1, 1941, Franz Haider, C-in-C of the Army GHQ, wrote in his diary that "ensuring safety in the rear of Army Group Centre was becoming a major task, and it apparently takes more than just security divisions to accomplish it".^^3^^ An order of September 16, 1941, signed by Keitel, C-in-C of the OKW GHQ, reads: "With the opening of hostilities against Soviet Russia, a communist-inspired resistance movement sprang up on German-occupied territory. It takes many forms-from purely propaganda actions to attacks on individual Wehrmacht servicemen to open uprisings and fullfledged war...''^^4^^
On August 18, 1942, the OKW issued Directive No. 46 stiffening anti-partisan operations and instructing all higher military staffs to carry out special combat operations against _-_-_
^^1^^ Resistance in Europe 1939--1945. Edited by Stephen Hawes and Ralph White. Penguin Books Ltd., London, 1975, p. 16.
~^^2^^ Bilanz des Zweiten Weltkrieges. Gerhard Stalling Verlag. OldenburgHamburg, 1953,5. 101.
~^^3^^ Generaloberst Haider, Kriegstagebuch 1939--1945. Band. 3, W. Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart, 1964, S. 32.
^^4^^ Hans Buchheim, Martin Broszat, Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Helmut Krausnick, Anatomie des SS^Staates. Band 2, Walter Verlag, OltenFreiburg, 1965, S. 259.
206 the partisans.^^1^^ In April 1943, Hitler signed a special order in which the organisation and the actual conduct of antipartisan operations were equated to those on the frontline. By their active operations in the rear and along communication lines the people's avengers tied up considerable forces of the enemy. Beginning with the middle of 1942 about 10 per cent of the Nazi troops were tied up in the struggle against the partisans on the Soviet-German front. In 1943, the OKW used auxiliary formations of "about 25 divisions against the partisans.The invaders were particularly concerned about the resistance put up by the whole population against the occupation regime. T. Oberlander, responsible for anti-partisan action on the southern sector of the Soviet-German front, reported to Berlin in October 1941: "Of still greater danger than the active resistance of the partisans is the passive resistance of the population, labour sabotage, and our chances of success in breaking that are even fewer.''^^2^^
Western historians have moved a whole array of often mutually exclusive arguments to give a distorted picture of the popular struggle of the Soviet people against the invaders. Some of them hold that the partisan movement was not initiated by the people but was forced upon them by the ``commisars'', who "drove civilians into the forests''. Others try to create the impression that the partisan movement was a ``spontaneous'' expression of "that mysterious Russian soul'', something the Soviet political leadership was not prepared for and unable "to get under control''.
Erich Helmdach (FRG) claims that the people of the temporarily occupied areas did not support the partisans, while the partisans themselves desisted from struggle.^^3^^ He is echoed by Edgar Howell (USA), who specialises in the Soviet partisan movement: "There was no question of a popular _-_-_
^^1^^ Hitlers Weisungen fur die Kriegfuhrung 1939--1945. Dokumente des Obcrkommandos der Wehrmacht. Bernard & Graefe Verlag fur Wehrwesen, Frankfurt am Main, 1962, S. 201.
~^^2^^ Quoted from: A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Vol. 4, p. 129.
^^3^^ See: Erich Helmdach, Uberfall? Kurt Vowinckel Verlag, Neckargemiind, 1976, S. 67.
207 rising; the mass of the people had no part in it.''^^1^^ Another study on the Soviet partisan movement contends that "the partisan movement was not a volunteer organization.''^^2^^The malicious theses of a coerced and an uncontrollable partisan movement were cooked up in order to conceal the popular and patriotic sources of the struggle of the Soviet people against the Nazi invaders.
The political and military leaders of the Soviet Union, who hailed the Soviet people's ardent wish to join in the active struggle against the enemy, took early measures to organise nation-wide popular resistance. On July 18, 1941, the Central Committee of the Communist Party adopted a decision "On the Organisation of a S truggle in the Rear of the German Army''. The directive read in part: "We shall be supported in every town and village by hundreds and thousands of our brothers and sisters who have fallen under the heel of the Nazis and who expect our help in organising the forces for the fight against the invaders.''
Already in 1941, in the first six months of the war, 18 underground regional party committees, more than 260 area, city and district committees and other underground party bodies, many primary party organisations and groups were set up in spite of the exceptionally difficult conditions of war and occupation. Altogether about 65,500 members of the Communist Party operated in the Nazi-occupied territory by the end of the first year of the war, organising the anti-Nazi struggle. In the Moscow region alone 41 partisan detachments and 37 sabotage groups operated that year.^^3^^ On May 30, 1942, the Central Headquarters of the partisan movement was set up.
The network of underground organisations was steadily expanding. In the autumn of 1943, 24 regional party committees, more than 370 area, city and district committees and other underground party bodies were operating on the Nazi-- _-_-_
^^1^^ Edgar M. Howell, The Soviet Partisan Movement, 1941--1944. Department of the Army, Pam. 20--244. Washington, 1956, p. 42.
~^^2^^ Soviet Partisans in World War II. Edited by John A. Armstrong, The University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1964, p. 152.
^^3^^ A. M. Samsonov, The Defeat of the Wehrmacht Near Moscow, p. 188 (in Russian).
208 occupied territory of the USSR. Party leadership strengthened the partisan movement which, in the words of Mikhail Kalinin "grew into a truly people's struggle which was gaining momentum with every passing month".^^1^^Some reactionary historians even attempt to prove that the partisan struggle of the Soviet people was against international law. They have borrowed from the arsenal of Goebbels propaganda and from modem U.S. Army manuals some insulting references to partisans who, in their words, "violated the traditional norms of warfare".^^2^^
Those historians should know that long before the outbreak of the Second World War, partisans were given legal status by international law. At two conferences held- in The Hague in 1899 and 1907 it was agreed that participants in the guerrilla movement should be protected by international law on an equal footing with the servicemen of regular armies.
The biased assessments of the character, scope and sources of the Soviet partisan movement are apparently part of the modem political strategy of world reactionary forces and are clearly aimed at discrediting this highly effective form of armed struggle for national independence, and against imperialist aggression.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ THE ART OF WARThe most important factors of the military might of the armed forces are the number and quality of divisions, their equipment, fighting efficiency, the organisation, the morale and fighting spirit of personnel. However, the outcome of an armed struggle also depends on how these armed forces will be used for achieving victory over the enemy, on the level of the science and art of war, the military skill and experience of commanders at all levels.
_-_-_^^1^^ M. I. Kalinin, On the Education of Communist Awareness. Moscow, 1974, p. 264 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Erich Hesse, Der sowjetrussische Partisanenkrieg 1941 bis 1944. Musterschmidt-Verlag, Gottingen, etc., 1969, S. 9; Kenneth Macksey, The Partisans of Europe in the Second World War. Stein and Day Publishers, New York;, 1975, pp. 74--77.
209The Great Patriotic War demonstrated the superiority of the Soviet art of warfare over that of the enemy, the maturity of Soviet military science, which is rooted in Marxist-Leninist theory, and the organisational talent and skill of Soviet military leaders.
Western publications often contain high assessments of the military art of the armed forces of the United States and Britain. They also extol the military art of fascist Germany, which lost the war. A retired American colonel, Trevor Dupuy, took upon himself the thankless mission of extolling "the superb combat performance of the German Army, with battlefield accomplishments probably exceeding the best of any other army in military history".^^1^^ The British historian A.J.P. Taylor, in a twist of logic designed to impress rather than convince, says that the Soviet-German front had no room for military art, that "this eastern war was still a war which turned on manpower: millions of men fought, millions were killed''. The combat operations fought in the West were, in his opinion, "the high point of scientific, civilized warfare".^^2^^
Most of these historians either keep silent about the achievements of Soviet military art or interpret them as the result of the enormous numerical superiority of the Soviet forces. Some Western publications make their readers believe that German troops were crushed by the steamroller of the Soviet numerical superiority.^^3^^ According to some British authors, "an advanced type of warfare'', the "tactical genius" and the ``brilliance'' of the Wehrmacht generals could not overcome the "enormous superior quantity of the Soviet forces.''^^4^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ The Russian Front. Germany's War in the East 1941--1945. Edited by James F. Dunnigan. Arms and Armour Press, London-Melbourne. 1978, p. 71.
^^2^^ A. J. P. Taylor, From Sarajevo to Potsdam. Thames and Hudson London, 1966, p. 183.
^^3^^ Erich Helmdach, UberfaU? S. 52.
^^4^^ World War II, Land, Sea & Air Battles 1939--1945, pp. 139, 136.
210The correlation of the belligerents' forces in every battle and in every operation is a crucial point in the art and science of war. The political and military leaders of a belligerent country always try, by making the best use of its military potential to achieve superiority or to destroy that of the enemy as soon as possible.
In the Great Patriotic War the correlation between the forces of the Soviet Army and the Wehrmacht was not always the same. In the initial period of the war the Wehrmacht had a preponderance in weapons and personnel. As the result of the tremendous efforts of the political and military leaders of the Soviet Union who mustered the entire potential of the state, the Soviet Union increased the strength of its army to equal that of the Nazi army and then achieved decisive superiority, as can be judged from the following table.^^1^^
Personnel and equipment June 22, 1941 November 1 , 1942 January 1, 1945 2.9 6.1 6.0 Troops (millions) 5.5 1.8* 6.1 6.0 3.1 11.0 Tanks and self-propelled guns (thousands) 3.7 34.7 6.6 72.5 4.0 91.4 Guns and mortars (thousands) 47.3 1.5** 70-1 3.1 28.5 14.6 5.0 3.5 io Note: The numerator shows data on the Soviet Armed Forces, and the denominatorthe German armed forces. * Without light tanks. ** Exclusively new models.At the start of the war the Wehrmacht had a twofold superiority in personnel, also had more guns, tanks and aircraft of the latest models. Such large-scale defensive operations as those fought at Leningrad (July 10--September _-_-_
~^^1^^ Fifty years of the Soviet Armed Forces, p. 459.
211 30, 1941), Smolensk (July 10 September 10, 1941), in the Ukraine west of the River Dnieper (July 10-August30,1941), at Moscow (September 30-December 5, 1941) were fought by the Soviet army against heavy odds when the enemy had a considerable edge both in manpower and equipment. The whole of the summer-and-autumn campaign when the Soviet armed forces were on the strategic defensive was fought against a numerically superior Nazi force. With all its serious reverses and heavy losses, the Soviet troops nevertheless frustrated the Blitzkrieg plans.The first defeat the Wehrmacht suffered was near Moscow, where incidentally the Soviet army had no superiority in force. The defensive operations in the Battle of Stalingrad (July 17-November 18, 1942) and in the Battle of the Caucasus (July 25, 1942-January 1, 1943) were also fought against the superior forces of the Wehrmacht.
When the Soviet army launched its counter-offensive at Stalingrad, which led to the ultimate encirclement and destruction of the enemy's largest force, the Soviet side had only the limited superiority in troops, guns and tanks, although the Nazi command was still superior in air striking power. It was only by the summer of 1943, owing to the organisational work of the Communist Party and the Soviet Government, to the efforts of the Supreme Command and to the heroic labour of the whole Soviet nation, that the Soviet armed forces achieved superiority on the battlefield. The Communist Party and the Soviet Government made the best possible use of the advantages of the socialist system to muster the strength of the entire nation in order to rout the invaders and to win in the Great Patriotic War.
Meanwhile Harrison Salisbury, in his book Marshal Zhukov's Greatest Battles (London, 1969), which is a counterfeit of Zhukov's memoirs, claims that the Red Army won its battles at a great sacrifice of human life, and that the Soviet Command-specifically Stalin and Zhukov-were responsible for the merciless ``waste'' of army personnel. These malicious inventions are aimed not only at denigrating the Soviet art of war, but also at concealing the true scope of Nazi savagery on the territory of the USSR.
Marshal Zhukov took Salisbury and other such falsifies 212 to task when he wrote: "Of course, it is easy now to work out on a piece of paper what the balance of forces was, or should have been and to advise, with a wise air, as to how many divisions should have been used in order to win a given engagement a quarter of a century ago, and discuss where the number of troops was above or below the limit any historian today might think practicable. On the battlefield all this is incomparably more complex.'' Marshal Zhukov rebuffed Salisbury's attempts to distort the truth of history. The Soviet command, he wrote, "committed as many troops as was warranted by the situation. It did not use any more personnel than a given operation required''.~^^1^^
The Soviet Communist Party, the Government and the Supreme Command in the most trying conditions of a war of extermination that Germany and international imperialism were waging on our country, exerted a maximum of effort to prevent heavy loss of life and to save the civilian population who would have otherwise been destroyed by the Nazis. At the same time, in planning combat operations, they took special care to save manpower resources, and to reduce casualties to a minimum.
Here is a documentary example.
In January 1944, the Maritime Army in the south had for a long time been making very little progress in a long drawnout battles outside the town of Kerch in the Crimea. The Supreme Command studied the situation in the zone of operation and issued this directive dated January 27, 1944:
``As is clear from the operations of the Maritime Army, its main efforts are directed at seizing Kerch by heavy street fighting. Fighting in the city leads to heavy loss of life (my italics-Author) and holds up the use of reinforcements: guns, tanks and aircraft.... The GHQ Supreme Command orders:
``1. To move the basic operations into the open terrain.
``2. To limit all fighting in the city to operations of auxiliary importance with a view to helping the main forces fighting in the open terrain.
``3. Acting upon these instructions, to regroup the _-_-_
^^1^^ Kommunist, 1970, No. 1, p. 93.
213 armed forces and to submit your considerations on further action to the General Staff not later than January 28, 1944.``GHQ Supreme Command. J.Stalin, Antonov.. No. 220014. January 27, 1944. 17 hours 20 minutes.''^^1^^
The art of warfare, the quality of combat training and the operations of the Soviet Air Force and Navy have also come under attack by reactionary historians.
They say, for example that the Soviet Air Force was not as good as the German Luftwaffe and its performance did not match that of the British and American air force. One of the exponents of this version is Klaus Uebe (USA) who, betraying inadequate knowledge of the S oviet Air Force, insists nonetheless that the Soviet Union's combat training programme was far below the European standards until the end of the conflict, and that "the Russian flyers ... normally had little technical knowledge".^^2^^
These historians say nothing that right at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War most of the Luftwaffe and its main striking force-the bombers-operated primarily on the Soviet-German front where it was heavily defeated. Soviet flyers shot down in air combats and destroyed on the airfields a total of 57,000 aircraft of the enemy. Altogether the Luftwaffe had lost more than 77,000 aircraft on the SovietGerman front, and these losses were 2.5 times as great as the number of German aircraft lost on all the other fronts of the Second World War.^^3^^ Significantly, many Western historians worthy of the name do not share Uebe's views. In an introduction to an English translation of The Soviet Air Force in World War II by a group of Soviet historians published in the United States (a rare event indeed) R.Wagner, a leading expert on the history of aviation, writes that the history of the mighty and victorious struggle on the Eastern front was a chronicle of the courage and skill of Soviet flyers. He also points out that the book offers a mine of information about the Soviet Air Force, the most powerful _-_-_
~^^1^^ Quoted from: Voenno-istorichesky zhurnal, 1971, No. 5, pp. 73--74.
^^2^^ Klaus Uebe, Russian Reaction to German Air Power. Arno Press, New York, 1964, pp. 5, 6, 8.
^^3^^ Krasnaya Zvezda, February 6, 1975.
214 outside the United States, and sheds light on the actual balance of power in the world.^^1^^As regards the Soviet Navy, it, in the words of Robert Herrick, "proved unable to adapt its naval strategy to the combination of strategic defense and tactical offense that the circumstances required".^^2^^ In an introduction to this book Arleigh Burke, a retired U.S. admiral known for his pro-fascist sympathies, writes that "the experiences of the Soviet Navy in combat cannot be a matter of pride".^^3^^ Herrick apparently tries to adjust the historical situation and historical facts to his own ideological and political concepts in order to detract from the achievements of the Soviet Navy.
In a letter to Stalin on December 30, 1942, President Roosevelt expressed his "appreciation of the part your gallant Navy is also contributing to the Allied cause...".^^4^^ Today American historians are backing away from this appraisal. Soviet Navy helped the land forces carry out operations in maritime areas, disrupted enemy communication lines and defended Soviet communication lines. In the years of the war the Soviet Navy carried 9,800,000 people (troops and civilians), more than 94,000,000 tons of military and civilian cargo by sea, river and lake.^^5^^ The Soviet Navy destroyed more than, 2,500 enemy warships, auxiliary vessels and transports.
Analysis of the Soviet art of warfare proves convincingly its superiority over that of the fascist Wehrmacht which at the time was the most powerful and the most experienced _-_-_
^^1^^ The Soviet Air Force in World War II. Edited and Annotated by R. Wagner, Doubleday, New York, 1973, p. V.
~^^2^^ Robert W. Herrick, Soviet Naval Strategy. Fifty Years of Theory and Practice. U.S. Naval Institute, Annapolis, 1971, p. 47.
^^3^^ Ibid., p. VII.
~^^4^^ Correspondence..., Volume Two, p. 46.
~^^5^^V. I. Achkasov, N. B. Pavlovich, The Soviet Naval Art in the Great Patriotic War. Moscow, 1973, pp. 37--38 (in Russian).
215 war machine of the capitalist world. The frustration of the Blitzkrieg plans and the rout of the Nazi troops at Moscow are evidence of this.In spite of the fact that at the start of the war the Soviet troops were forced to retreat from a large area of Soviet territory they nevertheless succeeded in accomplishing the tasks set for them by the Supreme Command. In the course of the defensive operations the enemy sustained heavy losses in manpower and materiel. The Nazi troops were worn down by the continuous fighting, the Wehrmacht plans were foiled, the enemy was halted on the approaches to Moscow and then beated back in a massive Soviet counteroffensive.
The experience gained in tne course of the strategic defensive operations in the summer and autumn of 1941 and in the first sweeping counter-offensive near Moscow served to further refine the Soviet art of warfare. An example of the competence of the Supreme Command, of the Front and Army HQs, of the commanders of large formations and smaller units was the Battle of Stalingrad, the greatest battle of the Second World War.
In this battle the Soviet armed forces brilliantly carried out strategic defensive and then offensive operations using several Fronts to encircle and destroy a massive concentration of enemy troops. Such operations have no match in the history of wars.
In the course of its defensive operations the Soviet command succeeded in setting up effective engineering fortifications in the way of the advancing superior forces of the enemy and put up stubborn resistance, launching counterattacks and in this way slowing down the enemy onslaught and forcing him to commit his reserves prematurely. The enemy advance was finally halted in the course of bloodv and stubborn fighting in Stalingrad itself. In these battles Soviet commanders of all ranks demonstrated their skill in the organisation and conduct of close-quarter combat.
One of the glorious examples of the truly creative initiative of Soviet officers and men, of their resourcefulness in the application of new combat tactics was the assignment of assault parties-small and highly mobile and 216 specially equipped (their auack core consisted of 10--12 men). By closing in on the enemy to within the distance of a hand-grenade throw, they prevented the Nazi airforce from striking at the Soviet forward lines for fear of hitting its own positions.. Another important task of the assault parties was to capture buildings and other strong points in lightning assault actions. After capturing the building and the weapon emplacements inside:, the assault parties set up their own defences and checked all the attempts by the enemy to regain their positions. "We countered the German rigid tactics with our own highly flexible tactic of street fighting which we developed in battle and kept improving all the time"^^1^^.
The Nazi troops were tied up in continuous combat operations and lost the initiative, which enabled the Soviet command to make covert preparations for a sweeping counter-offensive.
The GHQ Supreme Command planned to carry out its main strikes at the weakest points of the enemy defence several hundred kilometres apart. The strikes were to converge on the enemy with the aim of encircling it. To prevent the Nazis from manoeuvring their reserves to check the Soviet advance, the Soviet command planned diversionary offensive operations in other sectors of the front. The master plan for an all-out counteroffensive provided for the creation of special strike forces made up of armoured and mechanised formations which were to achieve a breakthrough in the enemy defences and to develop the success in the operational depth. This strategic plan was carried out in full. The precise cooperation of the Fronts and armies, the expertise of their commanders and the skill of the Soviet soldiers assured the success of the operations. At the same time the Soviet troops created in record time two rings of encirclementone on the inside and the other on the outside of the enemy forces, thus preventing the Nazi command from breaking through the blockade.
A prominent part in the Battle of Stalingrad was played by artillery which smashed the enemy defences and provided continual and reliable support for the advancing infantry and tanks. At Stalingrad the Soviet Command for the first time carried _-_-_
^^1^^ V. I. Chuikov, J'rom Stalingrad to Berlin, Moscow, 1980, p. 285 (in Russian).
__PRINTERS_P_218_COMMENT__ 13-682 217 out an artillery offensive. The armoured and mechanised formations were skilfully used for developing the tactical success into operational. A major role was also played by the Soviet Air Force which was concentrated in the directions of the main strikes by the Fronts.The party organisations which carried out political work in the army gained a great deal of experience in the Battle of Stalingrad. At the time when the Soviet armed forces were on the defensive the party and political work was directed primarily at building up the morale of the officers and men and their confidence in victory, at raising their stamina and courage so that they could hold out in the stubborn battle, to wear the enemy down and defeat him. During the offensive the task was to have the men understand the need to keep up the onward impetus so as to give the enemy no respite, and to drive him out of the country. "And if our troops, over the entire period of the war, and even in its darkest moments, never lost confidence in victory and always retained their high morale, credit for this goes to the Party and Komsomol workers,'' wrote Marshal Vassilevsky.^^1^^
The GHQ Supreme Command and Front HQs had a creative approach to the formulation of strategic decisions. For example, during the Battle of Stalingrad defensive operations were in fact a forced measure, since the strategic initiative came from the enemy. By contrast, the decision taken in the spring of 1943 to assume the defensive on the Kursk Salient was deliberate. The idea was to repulse the enemy and then go over to a sweeping counter-offensive.
The Soviet Command made the best possible use of such a complex operational manoeuvre as a large-scale converging offensive to encircle large concentrations of enemy troops. This required superb military skill, experience and creative thinking on the part of Soviet generals. After Stalingrad the converging offensive tactics became the predominant form of strategic operations of the Soviet armed forces and were widely used in such crucial battles of the Second World War as those fought at _-_-_
^^1^^ Novaya i noveishaya istoriya, 1982, No. 2, p. 8,<.
218 Korsun-Shevchenkovsky, Jassy-Kishinev, in Byelorussia, at Berlin, Prague and in Manchuria.With the might and the combat skill of the Soviet armed forces growing the Supreme Command had more room for manoeuvre in planning offensive operations. Back in 1943--1944, large scale offensive operations were carried out consecutively one at a time in different sectors of the Soviet-German front, whereas in 1945 several strategic offensive operations were carried out simultaneously. This, no doubt required a very high level of strategic thinking, veiy clear and precise coordination of actions by Fronts and armies, and sound organisation of logistic support. This was particularly important since the offensive operations were conducted to an ever increasing depth. In the winter of 1941--1942, for example, Fronts carried out offensive operations to a depth of 70400 kilometres, a year later at Stalingrad offensive operations developed to about 140--160 kilometres in depth, and in 1945 the Vistula-Oder operation was carried out to a depth of 550 kilometres.
Some Western historians allege that all the Soviet army set out to do in 1945 was to finish off an emaciated enemy. This interpretation of the goals of the Soviet Supreme Command was most likely prompted by the situation on the Western front. On the Eastern front the picture was quite different. For example, the Command of the 3rd Urkainian Front had learned in the spring of 1945 that the enemy was planning to mount an offensive in order to carry out long-range strategic objectives. General of the Army S. P. Ivanov, C-in-C of the Front HQ, recalls: "When the General Staff was informed of this plan, our report caused strong doubts. Even the Chief of the General Staff, General of the Army Antonov, sounded incredulous speaking over the telephone with Front Commander F. I. Tolbukhin; "Who would believe you that Hitler has moved the 6th Panzer Army of the SS from the West and sent it against the 3rd Ukrainian Front, and not to Berlin where preparations for the final operation to rout the Nazi troops are now underway?''^^1^^ As is known, the enemy mounted a massive offensive in the southern sector of the SovietGerman front on M arch 6, 1945. The fighting went on for ten days _-_-_
^^1^^ A. M. Samsonov, I he Collapse of the Nazi Aggression 1939--1945. Moscow, 1980, pp. (>4(> Ml (in Russian).
__PRINTERS_P_219_COMMENT__ 13* 219 and finally ended in the utter defeat of the attacking German force.Until the final hours of the war, fighting continued unabated. The strong and treacherous enemy put up fierce resistance. The situation at the front was complicated by frequent and rapid changes, which required optimal short-term strategic decisions on the part of the Soviet Command. These were carried out with heroism and self-sacrifice by the Soviet troops. The Soviet art of war was one of the most important contributions to the historic victory of the Soviet armed forces in the Great Patriotic War. The more biased among the Western historians would do well to recall the evidence of defeated Nazi generals who had first-hand knowledge of the Soviet art of war, also the assessments of political leaders and military experts in Btitain and America who at the time recognised the martial skill of the Soviet Command and lauded the brilliant victories of the Soviet Army on the battlefield.
In his testimony at the Nuremberg Trial Field Marshal Paulus said: "Soviet strategy proved to be so much better than ours, that I don't think the Russians would have had any use for me even as an instructor at an NCO school. The best proof of this is the outcome of the Battle on the Volga where I was eventually taken prisoner, and also the fact that these gentlemen (the political and military leaders of Nazi Germany-Author) are now sitting here in the dock."^^1^^
The political and military leaders of the Western Allies repeatedly stressed that the successful development and realisation of the strategic designs of the Soviet command hinged in large part on the courage and gallantry of the personnel of the Soviet armed forces, the high order of discipline and sense of duty, their unwavering resolve to defeat the hated enemy.
Referring to the victories of the Soviet armed forces, President Roosevelt wrote: "Such achievements can only be accomplished by an army that has skillful leadership, sound organization, adequate training and above all determination to defeat the enemy....''^^2^^
_-_-_^^1^^ Pravda, February 3, 1963.
~^^2^^ Correspondence..., Volume Two, p. 58.
220Western military experts have on many occasions spoken highly of the strategic and operational readiness of Soviet army headquarters, their organisational skill, precision and coordination of action in solving even the most difficult of tasks.
The former Chief of the General Staff of the National Defence of France, Marshal Juin, wrote: "The HQs and military leaders of the Red Army have shown remarkable willpower, talent in the art of warfare. Their headquarters and supreme commanders are possibly the only men today capable of conducting operations involving hundreds of divisions, of using them in wisely selected directions, of leading them forth across scorched earth over stunning distances, without losing the impetus of their offensive.''^^1^^
Henri Michel criticises the Western authors who praise the Wehrmacht's art of warfare and denigrate that of the Soviet army. "Of course, you could not call 'tartar horde' those who would, with clockwork precision, carry out well-coordinated offensive operations one after another in different sections of the front separated by hundreds of kilometres, and inexorably smash the combat formations designed and built by the 'great minds' of the OKH (the supreme command of the land forces of the WehrmachtAuthor). And finally, the Germans were defeated because Soviet strategic thinking and logistic support proved to be better than those of the enemy, and because the German generals could not match the wonderful generation of young Soviet marshals acting in accordance with the specific features of warfare in the Soviet Union.''^^2^^
__ALPHA_LVL2__ THE VANGUARDA special place among the sources of the victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War is held by the leading and guiding role of the Communist Party of the _-_-_
^^1^^ Hommage de la nation franfaise aux armies sovietiques. Editions France-USSR, Paris, 1945, pp. 21--22.
~^^2^^ Henri Michel, La seconde guerre mondiale. Tome 2, pp. 166--167.
221 Soviet Union. The Soviet people won a historic victory in that war because the political leader, organiser and inspirer of the working masses in the struggle agairrst the Nazi invaders was the Leninist Party, which was in the vanguard of the people and which enjoyed their boundless trust.At the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union had a great deal of experience in leading the country in wartime conditions-in the years of the Civil War and military intervention by imperialism in 1918--1920.
In a speech made on behalf of the Central Committee to the Ninth Congress of the Communist Party, Lenin said: "It was only because of the Party's vigilance and its strict discipline, because the authority of the Party united all government departments and institutions, because the slogans issued by the Central Committee were adopted by tens, hundreds, thousands and finally millions of people as one man, because incredible sacrifices were made-it was only because of all this that the miracle which occurred was made possible. It was only because of all this that we were able to win in spite of the campaigns of the imperialists of the Entente and of the whole world having been repeated twice, thrice and even four times.''^^1^^
In the years of the Great Patriotic War the CPSU assumed full responsibility for the destiny of the country and stood at the head of the fighting people. Equipped with Marxist theory and having extensive experience in running the Soviet state, the CPSU became a united mobilising and directing force of Soviet society, which enabled it to make the fullest possible and most rational use of the material and moral potential of the nation to defeat the Nazi invaders.
A directive of the Soviet Government and the Central Committee of the Party on June 29, 1941, reads: "...It is the task of the Bolsheviks to rally the entire nation around the Communist Party and the Soviet Government for the selfless support of the Red Army, for victory.... Now everything _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "Ninth Congress of the R.C.P.(B.). Report of the Centra! Committee, March 29'', Collected Works, Vol. 30, p. 446.
222 depends on our ability to organise and act without losing a minute, without wasting a single opportunity in the struggle against the enemy.''The Communist Party of the Soviet Union set forth the political and military goals of the war, and made clear the just, liberatory nature of the struggle of the Soviet people in defence of the gains of the October Revolution against the imperialist onslaught. In that the Party proceeded from Lenin's precepts that the understanding by the masses of the goals and reasons of the war is of the utmost importance for the ultimate victory. The Party directed the entire life of the Soviet Union and its armed struggle against the invaders.
The strength of the Party is in its indissoluble unity with the masses and the great esteem in which it is held by the people. On the battlefield, at factories, on collective and state farms, in the most difficult places, everywhere there were Communists who set an example for the masses in fighting and in labour and led them to victory. Lenin said; "When millions of working people unite as one and follow the best people from their class, victory is assured.''^^1^^ The conditions of the war required that the CPSU concentrate its efforts for the accomplishment of the main task: to rally the Soviet people in the struggle for the defence of the socialist Motherland. This task called for setting up special emergency party and state bodies and for redistributing the party forces to benefit the front.
Onjule 30, 1941, the State Committee for Defence (SCO) was set up which assumed the functions of supreme state and party leadership for the duration of the war. The SCD included the political and state leaders of the Soviet Union who were full members or alternate members of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Party. The highest military body which was directly in charge of the armed struggle on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War was the General Headquarters of the Supreme Command. Out of the ten of its members three were members of the _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "Two Recorded Speeches. Labour Discipline'', Collected Works, Vol. 30, p. 437.
223 Political Bureau, three were full members and two Alternate members of the Party's Central Committee. On questions of particular importance the Political Bureau, the SCD and the GHQ Supreme Command took joint decisions.Already at the end of 1941, the personnel of the Soviet Army and Navy had 1,234,000 Communists, which was more than twice as many as the number of full members and alternate members of the Party in the Soviet armed forces on the eve of the war.^^1^^ Altogether, about 6'0 per cent of the party membership took part in the fighting on the fronts of war.^^2^^
The immediate representatives of the Party in the Soviet armed forces were political workers. In his book Little Land, Leonid Brezhnev, who went through the whole war as a political worker in the army, speaks warmly about the Communists who discharged their party functions in the army. "The majority of our political department men, political instructors, Komsomol organisers and propagandists managed to strike the right note, they carried weight with the soldiers and, what is most important, the men knew that when things got tough those who called on them to stand their ground would be at their side, would stay with them and advance together with them, gun in hand and in the lead. The word of the Party, uttered with deep feeling and reinforced by deeds and by personal example in battle, was thus our main weapon. That was why the political workers became the heart and soul of the armed forces."^^3^^
To be a Communist during the war meant to be a committed, staunch defender of the socialist Motherland. Party members were always in the front ranks of the fighters, setting an example of courage and valour. The supreme law in the life and work of a party member was summed up in the watchword "Communists, to the fore!" And the Communists-commanders and political workers, _-_-_
~^^1^^ A History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Vol. 5, Book 1, pp. 170, 175.
~^^2^^ Praoda, May 9, 1982.
~^^3^^ L. I. Brezhnev, Little Land, Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, Moscow, 1978, p. 38.
224 officers and men-were always in the fore. Three million Communists gave up their lives on the frontlines of the Great Patriotic War. Of those who were awarded the highest military title of Hero of the Soviet Union in the years of the Great Patriotic War, 70 per cent were full members or candidate members of the Leninist Communist Party.^^1^^As we mentioned earlier on, some Western historians admit the advantages of the social and state system of the Soviet Union and its military organisation. Although very few of them write about the activities of the Communist Party in the war years. The French historian Yves Trotignon notes, though, that during the war the Communist Party of the Soviet Union "embodies the Soviet Motherland more than at any other time".^^2^^ However, assessments like this one are very few and far between, for in most cases the role played by the CPSU is either distorted or just ignored. Some bourgeois historians assert that during the war the Party and its Central Committee did not play any significant part at all.^^3^^
The ideological enemies of communism are well aware of the strength of the Communist Party and its leading role in the war effort, in the victories won by the Soviet army over the fascist invaders. However, when they speak about this role they never lose a chance to say something disparaging about the CPSU. For example, they like to hold forth about the contradictions which allegedly divided party and military leaders in the Soviet Union. Publications of this sort are grist for the mill of the Western Sovietologists and the anti-communist propaganda-mongers. One such Kremlin-watcher, David Dallin (a former Menshevik), speaks about a conflict between "the Party's communist position and national tendencies''. Raymond Garthoff divides all Soviet army officers into two groups: ``traditionalists'' and _-_-_
~^^1^^ A Military Encyclopaedia. Vol. 2, 1976, p. 539.
~^^2^^Yves Trotignon, Le XX-e siecle en U.R.S.S. Bordas, Paris, 1976, p. 120.
^^3^^ H. Brahm, Von der innerparteilich Demokratie unter Lenin zur Autokratie Statins. Koln, 1974, S. 18; History of Russia. Princett Hall, 1977, p. 561.
225 ``technocrats''. Roman Kolkowicz has drawn up a long list of such ``contradictions''. "Bourgeois historians who claim that there were contradictions between the Party and the army, between party leaders and military leaders are trying to counterpose the commanding party personnel and command cadres to political cadres, and contend that the first group embodies the army and the second group, the Party,'' writes Soviet Professor Yu. Petrov.^^1^^ There is not a grain of truth in all these assertions by reactionary historians.Proof of the growing prestige of the Communist Party, its inviolable unity; the faith that Soviet people had in the ideals of the Party and the recognition of its great services in the defence of the socialist Motherland was its growing membership in the years of the Great Patriotic War. A-total of 5,319,000 patriots joined the Party in this trying period in the life of Soviet people. In their applications for membership Soviet officers and men wrote "I want to go into battle as a Communist''. Their probation period was a test of courage in the life-and-death fight with the enemy. "What privileges could anyone expect, what rights could the Party grant him on the eve of a fierce engagement? Only one privilege, one right, one duty-to be the first up and into attack, the first to dash forward in the face of withering fire,'' wrote Leonid Brezhnev.^^2^^
The German imperialists lost two world wars. After the First World War General Hoffmann of the German General Staff wrote a book The War of Lost Opportunities. After the Second World War, Hitler's Field Marshal Manstein wrote a book Verlorene Siege (The Lost Victories). Both had hoped to win. That war was forced upon the Soviet Union. But the armed forces created and led by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union defeated the aggressors and established peace on earth.^^3^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Voenno-istorichesky zhurnal, 1969, No. 1, p. 4(>.
~^^2^^ L. I. Brezhnev, Little Land, p. 19.
^^3^^ For more on the subject see: S. L. Tikhvinsky, "The Results and Lessons of the Second World War'', International Affairs, No. 3, 1983.
226 __NUMERIC_LVL1__ CHAPTER FOUR __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE SECOND WORLD WAR ANDAt the end of December 1945, President Truman sent this message to Stalin; "I repeat my assurance to you that it is my earnest wish, and I am sure it is the wish of the people of the United States that the people of the Soviet Union and the people of the United States should work together to restore and maintain peace. I am sure that the common interest of our two countries in keeping the peace far outweighs any possible differences between us.''^^1^^
A few days later, early in January 1946, the same Truman wrote to State Secretary James Byrnes: "I do not think we should play compromise any longer. We should refuse to recognize Rumania and Bulgaria until they comply with our requirements; we should let our position on Iran be known in no uncertain terms and we should continue to insist on the internationalization of the Kiel Canal, the Rhine-Danube waterway and the Black Sea Straits and we should maintain complete control of Japan and the Pacific. We should rehabilitate China and create a strong government there. We should do the same for Korea.... I'm tired babying the Soviets.''^^2^^
What did tnis mean? Two completely different postwar policies or misinformation? Or maybe the second letter expresses the true aspirations of the American imperialists?
The answer to these questions will shed light on the _-_-_
^^1^^ Correspondence..., Volume Two, p. 279.
~^^2^^ James F. Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, Harper & Brothers PubUshers, New York, 1958, p. 402.
227 direct connection between the results of the Second World War and our time. __ALPHA_LVL2__ THE NEW BALANCE OF FORCES AND THEThe Second World War was an historic event which affected the entire course of development of civilisation. The defeat of German nazism and Japanese militarism raised a powerful wave of socio-political change, weakened world capitalism and signalled the most devastating defeat of the forces of reaction and war. The balance of forces moved decidedly in favour of peace, democracy and socialism. This was the logical result of the world historical process expedited by the war, which had exacerbated to the utmost the contradictions within the capitalist system.
Western historians do not deny the fact that the Second World War strongly influenced all further changes in the world. The victorious year of 1945 is sometimes referred to as "the most crucial year in the twentieth century''.^^1^^ Louis Morton describes the Second World War as "the decisive event of our own time, marking the end of one era and the beginning of another".^^2^^ The U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff pointed out early in 1945, i.e., before the end of the war, that "the changes occurring were more comparable indeed with that occasioned by the fall of Rome than with any other change occurring during the succeeding fifteen hundred years".^^3^^
While stating the historic significance of the results of the Second War, Western authors, as a rule, reject the objective character of the changes in the world and the logical course they take. They give their readers a distorted picture of the world historical process.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Jim Bishop, FDR's Last Year, April 1944-April 1945. William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York, 1974.
~^^2^^ The American Historical Review, 1970, No. 7, p. 1987.
~^^3^^ Michael S. Sherry, Preparing for the Next War. American Plans for Postwar Defense 1941--1945. Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1977, p. 163.
228The Second World War ended in the collapse and unconditional surrender of the Axis. The results of the war showed that no force in the world can crush the socialist system or bring to knees a nation loyal to the ideas of Marxism-Leninism, and devoted to its homeland.
The victory of the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War meant more than the defeat of Germany, her allies and satellites, and in fact the entire military-political organisation of the states of the fascist bloc. It proved Lenin's prophetic words that "any attempt to start a war against us will mean, to the states involved, that the terms they will get following such a war will be worse than those they could have obtained without a war or prior to it".^^1^^
The international prestige of the Soviet Union grew immensely, and so did its political influence throughout the world. One of the indicators of this process was the steadily expanding international ties of the Soviet Union: before the Great Patriotic War the USSR maintained diplomatic relations with 26 countries, whereas by the end of the war their number had grown to 52.^^2^^
The victory of the Soviet people had a great impact on world public opinion. People in the capitalist and colonial countries came to believe that the USSR, as a socialist country, is a bulwark of peace, democracy and social progress.
The General Secretary of the Central Committee of the French Communist Party, Maurice Thorez, voiced the sympathies of the French people for the Soviet Union in these words: "The incontestable superiority of the socialist system enabled the Soviet Union to play the decisive role in the destruction of Nazi fascism and in this way to save Europe from barbarous enslavement.
_-_-_~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, "The Eighth All-Russia Congress of Soviets, December 2229, 1920. Report on the Work of the Council of People's Commissars, December 22'', Collected Works, Vol. 31, 1974, p. 490.
~^^2^^ A History of the Foreign Policy of the USSR. 1945--1980. Vol. 2, Moscow, 1981, p. 9 (in Russian).
229 The alliance and friendship with the USSR have since become even dearer to the people of France, and still more desirable in the eyes of all French people fighting for their national independence.''^^1^^Wilhelm Pieck, the first President of the German Democratic Republic and a veteran of the German workingclass movement, formulated the importance of the Soviet victory for the German people in this one sentence: "It would be no exaggeration to say that it is to the Soviet Union that the German people owe not only their liberation from the bloody Nazi domination andon one third of German territory---from the reactionary forces of German imperialism, but also their continued existence as a nation.''^^2^^
The leaders of the capitalist world also spoke with appreciation about how much the world owed to the Soviet Union. In his message on Soviet Army Day in February 1945 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill wrote; "The Red Army celebrates its twenty-seventh anniversary amid triumphs which have won the unstinted applause of their allies and have sealed the doom of German militarism. Future generations will acknowledge their debt to the Red Army as unreservedly as do we who have lived to witness these proud achievements."^^3^^ The defeat of fascism and Japanese militarism in the Second World War was accompanied by a mounting democratic liberation movement throughout the world.
In a number of countries of Europe and Asia, new weak links appeared in the world system of capitalism. The struggle of the peoples for independence, for liberation from German and Japanese invaders grew into a revolutionary movement against capitalist dominance, for the elimination of exploitation of man by man, for genuine democracy, for the establishment of a new just social order. This struggle culminated in the victory of the _-_-_
^^1^^ Maurice Thorez, Selected Works. Vol. 2, Moscow, 1959, p. 543 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Wilhelm Pieck, Selected Works, Moscow, |95(i, p. 414 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ The Times, February 24, 1945, p. 2.
230 socialist revolutions in a number of countries of Europe and Asia, giving rise to a world socialist system which extended from the River Elba in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. This was the most important event in world history after the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution of 1917.The emergence of the world socialist svsiem drastically dictugcu the situation in the world, i'rom then on the course of history was determined by the existence of and the struggle between the two world systems, one of capitalism and the other of socialism. Socialism has since grown into a force with a decisive say in international relations.
The socialist countries are strengthening their positions in the world economy. In the period between 1950 and 1975 the average annual rate of industrial growth in the CMEA countries stood at 9.6 per cent, while in the advanced capitalist countries it was 4.6 per cent. The last several years have not been among the best for the national economy of the socialist states. Nevertheless the CMEA countries have kept up a rate of economic growth that was twice as high as in the advanced capitalist countries. The share of the socialist countries in world industrial production is growing steadily. In 1917, this share was 3 per cent, in 1939--10 per cent (only the USSR), in 1950--17.3 per cent (the USSR, the German Democratic Republic, the Bulgarian People's Republic, the Hungarian People's Republic, the Polish People's Republic, the Socialist Republic of Romania), and in 1975- about 34 per cent^^1^^.
The victory of the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War generated a powerful upsurge of the working-class movement in the capitalist countries, increased the role of the communist parties which, in the years of the struggle against fascism showed that they were the most loyal and the most reliable defenders of the interests of the people. Back in 1939, there were 61 communist _-_-_
~^^1^^ The Imperialist 1'nlicy of Military Hlocs History and Our lime. Moscow, 1980, p. I 7.) (in Russian!
231 parties in the world with a total membership of four million, whereas by September 1, 1945, the number of communist parties had increased to 76 with a total membership of 20 million Communists. Faced by the rising tide of democratic forces, the ruling elite in Italy, France and some other capitalist countries were forced to cooperate with the Communists, which created favourable conditions for the working-class struggle. At present, communist parties are an active force in 94 countries where their prestige with the masses is growing. In Western Europe alone, about 800,000 more people have joined the communist parties between 1970 and 1980.^^1^^The Soviet victory in the war had a powerful impact on the national liberation movement in the colonies and dependencies. Italy and Japan, two colonial powers, were defeated. The collapse of the German Reich brought an end to its plans for colonial conquests. Britain, France, Belgium, Holland and other metropolitan countries with colonial possessions had proved utterly incapable of defending the peoples of the colonies from fascist aggression. At the same time the participation of these peoples in the just war stimulated their national and class consciousness. The victory over the Axis in the Second World War made the liquidation of the colonial system of capitalism imminent. Over the years since the end of the war more than 100 new independent states have emerged in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The collapse of the system of colonial slavery under the pressure of the national liberation movement is an event of tremendous historic importance. The anti-imperialist policies of these states are reflected in the programme and the practical activities of the non-aligned movement.
The profound changes in the life of humanity ushered in a new era in the development of the world, _-_-_
~^^1^^ Documents and Resolutions. The 26th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, Moscow, 1981, p. 21.
232 revolutionary process. This is precisely the reason why shortly after the end of the war, many reactionary leaders and policy-makers in the West, followed by bourgeois historians, declared the Second World War ``senseless'', ``redundant'' and ``unnecessary''.One of the first to describe the last war an `` unnecessary'' was Winston Churchill. Speaking at Zurich University in 1946 he used the darkest colours to describe the situation in postwar Europe: "Among the victors there is a babel of jarring voices; among the vanquished the sullen silence of despair.''^^1^^ An American publication qualifies the results of the war as "a calamitous turning point in the history of mankind".^^2^^
``No other event of the past centuries deserves to be called a catastrophe so much as the Second World War,'' laments Michael Freund (FRG). "No spiritual upheaval, no war, no revolution changed the world so drastically. In it died the order of things which had been in existence for hundreds of years.''^^3^^ Richard Hobbs writes that "the unconditional surrender of Germany upset the balance of power in Europe, and that of Japan had similar results in Asia..., therefore, not only Germany and Japan but the whole of Western civilization lost the war".^^4^^ A rare exception to this consensus of gloom and despair is the view offered by A.J.P. Taylor; "Those who experienced it know that it was a war justified in its aims and successful in accomplishing them. Despite all the killing and destruction that accompanied it, the Second World War was a good war.''^^5^^
The hatred of the imperialists for social change, for the freedom and independence of the peoples is so intense that the fact that mankind has been saved from fascist _-_-_
^^1^^ Winston S. Churchill. His Complete Speeches, 1897--1963. Vol. VII (1943 1949). p. 7379.
~^^2^^ Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace. Edited by Hairy Elmer Barnes, The Caxton Printeis, Ltd.,Caldwell, 1953, p. 7.
~^^3^^ Michael Freund, Deutsche Geschichle, S. 1270.
~^^4^^ Richard Hobbs, The Myth of Victory: What Is Victory in War? Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado, 1979, p. 23,'l.
~^^5^^ A.J.P. Taylor, The Second World War, p. 234.
233 enslavement is viewed by them as a catastrophe. In an article published in NATO Review an American professor, Robert Strausz-Hupe, makes this revealing assessment: "(1) At the end of World War II, the West's primary influence in the Middle East, military, political and economic, was unchallenged; (2) In Africa, from Tangiers to Capetown, Western influence was paramount; (3) the Indian Ocean was a Western lake; and (4) the idea that the decision of a commodity cartel could cast the West into economic turmoil would have been laughed out of court.''^^1^^Summing up the results of the Second World War from these positions, the reactionary historians have come down upon the wartime policy of the United States and Britain for the alliance they made with the USSR and for their assistance in defeating the fascist bloc.
Professor Bruce Russett of Yale University tries to convince his reader that "had America remained in the status of twilight belligerence Germany probably would not have been defeated".^^2^^
There is a kind of regularity: the more reactionary the views of a historian or a political leader, the more cynical his statements in favour of an alliance with Nazi Germany against the USSR. They go as far as to declare President Roosevelt chiefly responsible for the Western Allies ``conceding'' the fruits of victory to Soviet Russia. They do not conceal the fact that the main result of the Second World War-the strengthening of the position of the Soviet Union and the forces of socialism in the international arena-does not suit the ruling elite in the United States, and lament over Roosevelt's failure to take the opportunity of destroying the USSR, using the Germans and the Japanese to do the job. To justify this pro-fascist concept, the falsifiers of history resort to their _-_-_
~^^1^^ Robert Strausz-Hupe, "NATO in Midsteam'', NATO Review, No. 5, October 1977, p. (>.
~^^2^^ Bruce M. Russett, No Clear and Present Danger. A Sceptical View of the United States Entry into World War II. Harper & Row Publishers. New York, 1972, pp. 19--20, 30.
234 pet arguments of "Moscow s totalitarianism" and the ``threat'' to American interests. "The concentration of totalitarian striking power in a single center, Moscow, is more disadvantageous and menacing from the standpoint of American security than the distribution of this power among several centers, in Berlin, Tokyo, Moscow and Rome,'' write the authors of Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace. "Moreover, communism is more dan;;-.-vous than National Socialism, Fascism, or Japanese authoritarianism....''^^1^^In his memoirs Charles Bohlen, former U.S. ambassador to the USSR, joins in the criticism of the foreign policy of the Roosevelt Administration and even tries to smear the reputation of the President and his close associates Hopkins, Stettinus, Harriman and other American political and military leaders who were in favour of a more realistic policy in U.S. relations with the Soviet Union. Bohlen says, for example, that Harriman never "really fully understood the nature of the Soviet system'', and adds that the U.S. military attache in Moscow, Colonel Faymonville, "was not very useful because he was inclined to favor the Soviet regime in almost all actions...".^^2^^ Bohlen is careful to say that he himself was totally committed to anti Sovietism. "Yet in those days l found it almost impossible to convince others that admiration for the extraordinary valor of the Russian troops and the unquestioned 'heroism of the Russian people was blinding Americans to the dangers of the Bolshevik leaders,'' he writes.^^3^^
Bourgeois historians criticise Roosevelt's policy not only for its own sake. Their more long-range goals are directly linked with the present-day policies of the imperialists, and so they are trying to discredit the wartime antiHitler coalition and thereby undermine the faith of the people of capitalist countries in the possibility of peaceful _-_-_
^^1^^ Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace, pp. 523--524.
~^^2^^ Charles Kolilen, Witness to History 1924-1.W9. NorKm, New York, 1973, pp. 127, .W.
^^3^^ IbirL, p. I 2.r>.
235 cooperation with the socialist countries, ostensibly because this cooperation "has always served the interests of Moscow alone''.The well-known reactionary and pro-fascist French magazine Lectures francaises writes: "History was developing in a direction opposite to that expected by the political leaders who thought that it was they who made history. Hitler lost the war because he had misjudged the direction of British policy. Churchill lost his victory because he had failed to understand in time that it was necessary to alter the trajectory of the policies of the democratic powers long before Germany was defeated.''^^1^^
This is the general concept of the results of the war in the interpretation of bourgeois historians and memoir writers who use it to justify- directly or indirectly- the policy of the imperialists today.
``After the grandiose battle came to a finale and the enemy was defeated,'' wrote Leonid Brezhnev, "the main participants in the anti-Hitler coalition did not follow the common road of building a stable peace but parted ways. To use a metaphor, hardly had the ink dried on the Instruments of Surrender, signed in Berlin by representatives of the USSR, USA, Britain and France, when our former Allies began breaking the links that tied together the main participants in the war against German fascism".^^2^^
The responsibility for this policy rests chiefly with U.S. imperialism, which is harbouring plans for establishing its domination throughout the world. Back in 1940, Virgil Jordan, President of the National Industrial Conference Board (USA), said: "Whatever the outcome of the war, America has embarked upon a career of imperialism, both in world affairs and in every other aspect of her life.''^^3^^ _-_-_
^^1^^ Lectures francaises. Sous la direction de Henry Coston, Numero special, May 1975, p. 11.
~^^2^^ L. I. Brezhnev, Following Lenin's Course, Vol. I, pp. 149--150 (in Russian).
^^3^^ John M. Swamley, Jr., American Empire. The Political Ethics of Twentieth-Century Conquest. The Macmillan Company, London, 1970, p. 95.
236 It is true, though, that while the war was in progress, the United States carefully camouflaged its aggressive goals. American historians Joyce and Gabriel Kolko have come to this conclusion: "Essentially, the United States' aim was to restructure the world so that American business could trade, operate, and profit without restrictions everywhere. On this there was absolute unanimity among the American leaders, and it was around this care that they elaborated their policies and programs.''^^1^^The American atomic monopoly created the illusion that world domination was now within the grasp of the U.S. In that situation the Truman Administration started preparations for another war. "The Russians would soon be put in their places.... The United States would then take the lead in running the world in the way that the world ought to be run,'' Truman prophesised.^^2^^
The atomic bomb had turned Truman's head, and not only his. "In the meantime,'' said ex-President Herbert Hoover, "it gives the United States and Britain the power to dictate political policies to the whole world.''^^3^^
Arthur Schlesinger, in his book The Crisis of Confidence, also notes this postwar turnabout in U.S. foreign policy which incorporates the brainwashing of the world public into accepting the reactionary politics of the United Statesboth domestic and foreign. Anti-communist and antiSoviet propaganda have become part of the daily routine of the American administration.
The key element in this propaganda now is the myth of a Soviet threat, which has been developed into principal ideological weapon, meant to defend and justify the policy of the cold war and the arms drive, in fact any aggressive action of the imperialists, in whatever part of the world: against Afghanistan or the German Democratic Republic, Czechoslovakia or Poland, Korea or Vietnam, Laos or _-_-_
^^1^^ Joyce and Gabriel Kolko, The Limits of Power. The World and the United States Foreign Policy, 1945--1954. Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, 1972, p. 2.
~^^2^^Quoted from: William Appleman Williams, The Tragedy of American Diplomacy. The World Publishing Company, Cleveland, etc., 1959, p. 168.
~^^3^^Herbert Hoover, Addresses upon the American Road 1945--1948. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., New York, 1949, p. 14.
237 Kampuchea, Lebanon or Egypt, Cuba or the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua or El Salvador. The myth of the Soviet threat is used as a screen behind which to generate hatred and suspicion of the Soviet Union, the other socialist countries, uie working-class and the national liberation movement.^^1^^At the time when President Truman was assuring Stalin of his "sincere desire to work together to restore and maintain peace'', the commander of the Allied forces in Europe, General Eisenhower and his staff had sent to Washington a plan for starting a war against the Soviet Union, later codenamed Dropshot. When all details were filled in, the plan was endorsed by President Truman. The implementation of this plan was at the centre of the entire foreign and domestic policy of the United States, and later of its allies in NATO and other Western blocs.
The Dropshot Plan epitomised the policy of the United States, and today provides an excellent understanding in retrospect of Churchill's call for a crusade against socialism which he 'made in March 1946 in Fulton, in the presence of HarryTruman. It gives an insight into the sources of the cold war and McCarthyism, into the reasons for the negative assessments of the results of the Second World War and the myth of a Soviet threat as a means of deceiving the American people and the world public with regard to the true aims of the policy of the United States.
The plan for an attack on the Soviet Union came to light when certain American documents were made public in 1978. These show that the attack was to be started under the false pretext of an alleged Soviet invasion of Western Europe. Moreover, the plan provided for all-out military actions with the unlimited use of nuclear weapons and for participation in them by all nations on all the continents. In other words, the American plans provided for unleashing no less than a third world war.
One of the striking features of Dropshot is its class character. "The gravest threat to the security of the United _-_-_
^^1^^ Whence the Threat to Peace, Military Publishing House, Moscow, 1982, p. 75.
238 States (i.e., the power of the American monopolies---Author.}... stems from the nature of the Soviet system''. The principal political goals of the projected war, as revealed in the above documents, were to destroy the roots of Bolshevism by destroying the USSR and its allies, to restore capitalism and colonialism, and to establish American world domination with the help of NATO.The strategic objective of Dropshot was formulated in these words: "In collaboration with our allies, to impose the Allied war objectives upon the USSR by destroying the Soviet will and capacity to resist, by conducting a strategic offensive in Western Eurasia and a strategic defensive in the Far East.''^^1^^
The plan was to be carried out in four stages.
First stage-a surprise attack with weapons of mass destruction upon the territory of the USSR, especially its more thickly populated areas (300 atom bombs in 30 days). This initial attack was to be continued with atomic and ``conventional'' (250,000 bombs) weapons.
This massive air attack was to immobilise 85 per cent of Soviet industry and about 95 per cent of the industry in the other socialist countries, with a total of 6,700,000 civilians killed.
Second stage- preparation for offensive operations with a view to invading the territory of the USSR and its allies. Air bombings were to continue, with NATO completing the concentration of 164 divisions (including 69 U.S. divisions) and 7,400 aircraft on the borders of the USSR and the other socialist countries. The naval force was to carry out landing operations from 24 escort aircraft carriers and about 700 warships of the main classes. The armed forces of NATO, also of Australia, New Zealand and the Union of South Africa were in that period to control all ocean and sea communication lines.
Third stage---seizure of the territory of the USSR and its allies by the armed forces of the United States and other _-_-_
~^^1^^ Dropshot. The United States Plan for War with the Soviet Union in 1957. Edited by Anthony Cave Brown, The Dial Press-James Wade, New York, 1978, pp. 42, 47.
239 NATO countries. These objectives were to be achieved using not only atomic weapons, but also other weapons of mass destruction, such as chemical, biological and radiological. It was specifipu that "in this campaign emphasis has been placed on physical destruction of the enemy's ability to resist.''Fourth stage-the establishment of an occupation regime on the territory of the USSR, which was to be split into four occupation zones, with American troops stationed in the key cities of the USSR, also in Gdansk, Warsaw, Sofia, Prague, Budapest, Bucharest, Constanta, Belgrade, Zagreb, Tirana and Seoul.
The American strategists did not stop at that. After the defeat of the Soviet Union and its allies in Europe and of the Korean People's Democratic Republic in the Far East, they planned to occupy the Mongolian People's Republic, China and the whole of Southeast Asia, also to crush " procommunist revolts" in Indochina, Malaya, Burma and other areas, in other words, to suppress the national liberation movement in the whole world and to restore the colonial domination of imperialism.
In accordance with the Dropshot plan a total of 250 divisions with a total of 6,250,000 troops were to be moved against the USSR, with another 8,000,000 operating in the air force, the navy, the air defence and support troops. The total number of troops operating under U.S. command was to reach 20 million.^^1^^
The American strategists also outlined broad-scale operations under a special programme of "psychological warfare'', as part of Dropshot, aimed at undermining the morale of the Soviet population and using traitors (``dissidents'') against the Soviet system. "More effective resistance, however, in this form of organized sabotage and guerilla activity would be unlikely to develop significantly until they are assured of guidance and support from the West.''^^2^^
Such was the American idea of fighting a "preventive _-_-_
^^1^^ Dropshot. The United States Plan for War with the Soviet Union in 755_7., p. 241.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 75.
240 war" against the USSR and the other socialist countries under the Dropshot Plan, which remained in force until 1957.British plans for war with the Soviet Union followed more or less the same pattern.
In July 1981, The Times wrote that between January and July 1946, Britain's Joint Chiefs of Staff worked out their own plans of war against the USSR, which included the use of bacteriological weapons. In June 1946, they submitted a special report to the Cabinet on future trends in the development of armaments and methods of warfare. The authors of this report had made a detailed study of the possible use of atomic and bacteriological weapons against the USSR. In their evaluation, bombers based in Britain could hit 58 Soviet cities with a population of over 100,000 each, located within 1,500 miles of British military airfields. If the flight range of British bombers were extended to 1,850 miles, another 21 major Soviet .cities could come within their reach.^^1^^
However, .the American and British plans for war with the USSR, using weapons of mass destruction, proved to be utterly unrealistic. After the Second World War the Soviet Union built up such economic and military power that the warmongering imperialists would have been unable to break it down. A most serious blow to these plans was the end of the American monopoly of the atomic weapons. The Soviet Union developed its own atomic, and later, hydrogen weapons and equipped its armed forces with it. Truman wrote in his memoirs: "Our monopoly came to an end sooner than the experts had predicted.''^^2^^ The creation of powerful intercontinental missiles in the Soviet Union, as well as the successful launchings of Soviet space satellites and spaceships, dashed the last hopes for America's superiority and its global export of counter-revolution. A world war, should it break out, would be equally dangerous for the United States, the citadel of world imperialism.
The rough parity achieved in the 1970 induced _-_-_
~^^1^^ Quoted from: Pravda, July 13, 1.981.
~^^2^^ Harry S. Truman, Memoirs. Volume II. Years of Trial and Hope. Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, etc., 1956, p. 306.
241 substantial adjustments in the U.S. aggressive plans. Nevertheless, the main political aim of imperialist reaction remained unchanged: to weaken socialism, to undermine the unity of the socialist countries, to prepare for war and, if an opportunity offered, to destroy the Soviet Union by military means.American ruling groups continue to plan long-term political actions against the Soviet Union. Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, former C-in-C of the U.S. Navy, writes in Grand Strategy for the 1980s: "The Soviet Union is clearly the main antagonist of the United States.... Since today and for the foreseeable future the principal obstacle to the achievement of American goals is the Soviet Union.... We need to marshal political and economic force to promote our own interests and frustrate those of the Soviet Union.''^^1^^
The arms manufacturers and the men in the Pentagon are still "thinking about the unthinkable'', of starting a nuclear conflict with the Soviet Union. A senior official at the Council on Foreign Relations, L. Sigal, has said that the development of new weapons systems has prompted the American military strategists to review discussions on the possibility and expediency of nuclear war against the USSR.^^2^^ Now they are busy working on the theory of ``small'', ``local'' nuclear wars which the American imperialists hope will help them achieve their strategic objectives. In the summer of 1980 President Carter signed Directive 59 on "the new U.S. nuclear strategy" which allows of fighting limited nuclear wars in areas far from the United States, and primarily in Europe.
Speaking at the 35th session of the UN General Assembly, Soviet Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrei Gromyko exposed this strategy as dangerous and adventuristic. He said: "Using all these totally irrational disquisitions about the -possibility of some sort of `limited' or `partial' utilisation of nuclear weapons to cover up their real aims, the authors of this strategy are trying to plant in people's minds the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Grand Strategy for the 7980's. American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, Washington, 1978, pp. 38, 51.
~^^2^^ Foreign Policy, Spring 1979, p. 51.
242 idea that a nuclear conflict is both possible and acceptable. This reckless concept serves to increase the risk of nuclear catastrophe, which cannot but cause alarm everywhere in the world".^^1^^The Reagan Administration which took office in 1981 set off a new steep spiral in the arms race in the United States and its NATO allies. The most dramatic move in this direction is the decision to site medium-range missiles in Europe and to start production of the neutron weapons, which threaten the security of all nations.
The Soviet Union is waging a consistent struggle for peace, for the mutual limitation of strategic offensive weapons and other weapons of mass destruction. "At the same time there is no room for doubt that in the light of these American actions, the Soviet Union will make an appropriate assessment of the situation and will take the necessary measures to ensure its security and the security of its friends and allies,'' reads a TASS Statement of August 14, 1981, in connection with President Reagan's decision to start the production of the neutron weapon.^^2^^
Many researchers in the West find the claims of the Reagan Administration about "the Soviet threat" utterly unconvincing. In his new book Michael Howard, Regius Professor of History, Oxford University, notes cautiously that: "...the feeling is general in Western Europe that American perceptions of the Soviet threat owe as much to internal factors in American policy-military-industrial pressures and, even more important, the need to rediscover national self-confidence after the humiliations of Vietnam and Watergate-as they do to the actual behaviour of the Soviet Union".^^3^^ Nevertheless, preparations for a new war are going forward on an increasingly large scale.
In just the years of Reagan's administration the United States has:~
---begun the production of a new first-strike weapon, the MX intercontinental ballistic missile, warheads of intensive _-_-_
~^^1^^ Pravda, September 24, 1980.
~^^2^^ Pravda, August 14, 1981.
^^3^^ Michael Howard, The Causes of Wars. Harward University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1983, p. 3.
243 radiation (neutron weapons) for the Lance tactical missiles and artillery shells;~- sent the B-l strategic bomber on its first transatlantic flight to Europe; made operational giant nuclear-powered submarines of the Trident series, equipped with the newest types of ballistic missiles;~
- completed the testing of new nuclear-missile systemsPershing-2 medium-range missiles and cruise missiles-and began deploying them in Europe;~
- developed a programme for expanded production of new toxic chemical agents;~
- set up a Military Space Command under the Pentagon.
In 1983/84 fiscal year, the United States plans to raise its military expenditures to 280 billion dollard and is to funnel more than three-quarters of its budget into war preparations by 1986, all that at the expense of social security, medical service, housing, and other public needs.
But it would be wrong to assume that the White House is thinking of nothing but building up its weapons stockpiles to prepare an attack on the Soviet Union and the other socialist countries, and turn Western Europe into the hostage of U.S. security. That is not all, for over the long term it is only a prelude to the secret plans of the American imperialists to dominate the world, to Americanise the globe.
In one of its many propaganda brochures, called Soviet Military Power (1983), the Pentagon takes exception to the growing number of nuclear warheads in the USSR. But who has forced us to take this step? Who has turned a deaf ear to Soviet appeals not to start a new round of the arms drive?
The USSR and the forces supporting it are the main obstacle to the implementation of the hegemonistic plans of the USA. That is why the main blow is to be spearheaded against the Soviet Union. One cannot ignore the dangerous plans and actions of the American imperialists.
The consolidation of the forces of peace, democracy and socialism was something that followed the Second World War in the natural course of events, but is now being used by the international reactionary forces to justify the arms drive, the U.S. and NATO policies, which go against the interests of 244 the peoples, also to camouflage aggressive plans which threaten the very existence of mankind.
Defying the incontrovertible facts and documents, Western historians try to present the aggressive policy of the United States and its NATO allies as some sort of "reaction to imperialistic advances made by the Soviet Union to establish a domain of economic and political influence''.
Referring to the effect of the Western propaganda media, historian Andrew Rothstein, a veteran of the British Communist movement, wrote that a citizen of a socialist country would find it rather difficult to understand to what extent the overwhelming majority of the people in Britain are ignorant of the very existence of the Soviet disarmament proposals, to say nothing of the details. So dense has been the cloak of silence in the capitalist media and political speeches.
This could well be applied to the people in the United States and other capitalist countries.
The Soviet Union has never sought world domination, nor will it ever do so. It is the anti-Soviet policy of the ruling elite of the United States and Britain that has left its simister mark on the development of the international situation after the war.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ HISTORIANS VS. HISTORYRight from its very inception, the Soviet state has worked for a lasting peace on earth. This is the road it has followed for six and a half decades. No provocations, intrigues or threats of the imperialists will ever force the Soviet Union and its allies off their chosen path. Over the postwar years the Soviet Union has made more than a hundred proposals directed at stopping the arms drive, achieving disarmament, and ensuring a peaceful and secure life for all nations.
The reactionary forces of imperialism pursue a different kind of policy. Over the 200-odd years of its existence the 245 United Stales has iought aggressive wars against almost 50 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South America, carried out hundreds of punitive operations against the peoples of colonial and dependent countries. In just the years follosving the Second World War, the forces of aggression and militarism started about 150 local wars and rnilitarv conflicts which took more than 25 million lives. In the period between 194(> and 1975, the United States resorted, directly or indirectly, to the use of force or threatened other countries with military intervention 215 times. Nineteen times the U.S. government discussed the possibility of making direct use of nuclear weapons, thus pushing the world to the brink of nuclear catastrophe.^^1^^
Some of the ``research'', allegedly based on historical experience, prepared and published in the United States and other capitalist countries is clearly aimed at fanning the flames of a new war. These so-called historians defy the lessons of history. The scope of their work is fairly wide and ranges across different periods of world history. Much of the space in their ``research'' is devoted to outright falsification of the results and lessons of the Second World War with the apparent aim of instigating a war against the USSR, exonerating the Na/.is of their crimes and spreading, ideas of revanche and anti-Sovietism.
Here is an example. Louis Fischer, whom we mentioned earlier in this account, gives what might at first glance be an objective assessment of the defeat of the Nazi troops at Moscow. He writes that this victory was the result of the staunchness and bravery of the generals and soldiers of the Red Army and of the whole Soviet people. In his view, the conclusion to be drawn from the defeat of the armies of Napoleon and Hitler is that "there is never likely to be another invasion of Russia from the west".^^2^^
But why "from the west"? A reply to this question can be found in an American maga/ine which carried an article, "Tlie Eighth Road to Moscow", written at the time Fischer _-_-_
~^^1^^ Whence the Ihreat to t'eace. Moscow, 1982, p. 75.
^^2^^ Louis Fischer. The Road to Yalta. Harper & Row Publishers, New York, 1!>72. p. .'-(9.
246 was working on his book. Its author, Lieutenant Colonel Dave R. Palmer, says that over its entire history the USSR has been attacked seven times, the first time by the Vikings and the last by Nazi Germany in 1941. But all these campaigns failed because, as he put it, the invaders came from the west. Now Palmer suggests a possible eighth campaign, this one to be undertaken from the east. Discussing why the main strike should be delivered upon the USSR from the east, the magazine writes: "Why, Red China might be our staunchest ally in a conflict with Russia.... Old admonitions against a ground war in Asia simply cannot be permitted to blind us to future possibilities. Whether or not we can launch an invasion from Asia today might be a moot point. But it is distinctly possible tomorrow.'' American forces, he continues, would constitute the bulk of the main attack's strength using Pacific bases as a springboard, including "perhaps even parts of mainland China itself. An invasion from the west, which the author describes as a secondary attack, would most likely be "spearheaded by [West] Germany''. Hence the conclusion, "In short, launching the main attack from China is not only a feasible alternative, it just might be the best alternative''.^^1^^Such provocative assertions and recommendations are strongly reminiscent of the calculations made by the Munich dealers in the late 'thirties. But the Second World War is known to have begun as a conflict between those same countries which had sought to form a common anti-Soviet alliance. The irreconcilable contradictions between them proved to be stronger than their collective hatred of the USSR. The United States and Britain did finally see Nazi Germany attack the USSR, but by that time the very existence of the Western democracies depended on the ability of the USSR to hold out against and defeat the Nazi invaders.
In planning their further ventures the forces of world imperialism, and especially the United States and its NATO allies, stake heavily on the possibility of winning a nuclear war against the USSR. The concept that nuclear war is ``acceptable'' is central to the militaristic propaganda. Those _-_-_
^^1^^ Armor, November-December 1969, No. 6, pp. 54, 55.
247 of the reactionary historians who, like Leonard Cooper, are pure-bred warmongers have contributed to this criminal campaign. Cooper has written a book, Many Roads to Moscow, in which he examines the reasons for the defeat of the Swedish King Charles XII, Napoleon and Hitler, and picks up the old traditional postulates such as "the vast Russian expanses'', "a huge population'', "rigorous climate'', etc. "Is it true ... that the same insuperable difficulties must always confront any aggressor who is mad or desperate enough to attempt the conquest of Russia by land?" he asks rhetorically. And replies: "It must be true that there is too much of Russia ... for such a venture ever to succeed by conventional means'',^^1^^ (my italics-Author), hinting that atomic weapons could be used to cut a new road to Moscow.The attempts of reactionary historians directed at justifying the crimes of fascism can only be viewed as part of the imperialist preparations for war against the Soviet Union, and all the revolutionary forces of our time, as part of concrete plans for a war in which hundreds of millions of people must die. The techniques used by the falsifiers of history are the same as ever: fraud and provocation, organised in part or wholly by the CIA and other subversive centres.
For many years, reactionary propaganda has tried to make hay on the "Katyn affair'', an attempt to charge the chief Soviet security body (People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs) with the murder of 11,000 Polish army officers who had been massacred by the Nazis in the autumn of 1941, in Katyn Forest near Smolensk.
The history of these attempts is instructive. The allegation was lifted bodily out of a forgery circulr ted by the Goebbels's office in the spring of 1943, shortly before the liberation of Smolensk by the Soviet Army, in anticipation of the imminent exposure of the Nazi cannibals who had _-_-_
~^^1^^ Leonard Cooper, Many Roads to Moscow. Three. Historical Invasions. Hamish Hamilton, London, 1968, p. 231.
248 committed yet another atrocity: the mass killing of Polish prisoners of war. An official Soviet announcement published on April 16, 1943, says: "The Goebbels' slanderers have over the past two or three days been circulating some vicious lies about what they allege was the shooting of Polish officers by Soviet security bodies outside Smolensk in the spring of 1940.... The Nazi reports on this issue leave no room for doubt as to the tragic fate of the former Polish army men who in 1941 were in an area west of Smolensk doing construction work, and who, together with many Soviet people, residents of Smolensk Region, fell into the hands of the Nazi butchers. By spreading these slanderous inventions about alleged Soviet atrocities in the spring of 1940, the Nazis are now trying to dodge the responsibility for this savage crime.... The Nazi murderers who annihilated many hundreds of thousands of Polish citizens will never be able to deceive anybody with their vile lies and slander....''^^1^^Later events showed that this fraud perpetrated by Goebbels pursued far-reaching goals: to split the anti-Hitler coalition and secure a favourable foreign policy situation for a summer offensive on the Soviet-German front (preparations for Operation Citadel-a Wehrmacht offensive on the Kursk Salient-began in March 1943). "German propaganda has produced this story precisely in order to make a rift in the ranks of the United Nations'',^^2^^ wrote Churchill.
The British Prime Minister played a double game, trying in every way to weaken the Soviet Union's position in the anti-Hitler coalition after the decisive victory at Stalingrad. It was not without Churchill's knowledge that the Polish government-in-exile repeated Goebbels' lies. It published a statement slandering the Soviet Union and, almost simultaneously with the Nazis, requested the International Red Cross to carry out an on-the spot investigation in Katyn Forest, on territory which at that time was occupied and controlled by the Nazis, a request that could only have played into their hands.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Pravda, April 16, 1943.
~^^2^^ Correspondence..., Volume One, p. I'.
__PRINTERS_P_249_COMMENT__ 14--682 249``The fact that the anti-Soviet campaign has been started simultaneously in the German and Polish press and follows identical lines is indubitable evidence of contact and collusion between Hi tier-the Allies' enemy-and the Sikorski Government in this hostile campaign,'' Stalin wrote to Churchill and Roosevelt.^^1^^ The anti-Soviet actions of the London-based Polish government-in-exile forced the USSR to sever all relations with it.
The Times wrote about the Katyn massacre: "Several questions immediately arise. The Germans have occupied the district for nearly two years: how is it that they have only now discovered these graves? ...The Germans themselves have murdered many thousands of Poles, and boasted of it. Are they trying to turn the murder of some of their own victims to their advantage? How is it that their own stories about the discovery differ so widely in content?
``At one hour they say they heard about the murders two years ago; a little later they declare that they heard only at the end of March of this year. Their estimates about the number of bodies vary day by day-from 1,200 to 15,000.
``They know in fact that there can be no independent or thorough inquiry, and so feel themselves free to invent and embellish as they wish.''^^2^^
Right after the liberation of Smolensk by the Soviet Army in September 1943, a special Soviet government commission was set up to investigate the circumstances of the shooting by the Nazi invaders of the Polish POWs in Katyn Forest. The commission included prominent forensic experts and representatives of the public, including Academician N. Burdenko, Academician V.Potyomkin, People's Commissar for Education, author Alexei Tolstoy, Moscow Metropolitan Nikolai of the Russian Orthodox Church, and others.
``On perusal of all the material at the disposal of the special commission, that is, the depositions of over 100 witnesses questioned, the data of the medico-legal experts, the documents and the material evidence and belongings taken _-_-_
^^1^^ Correspondence..., Volume One, p. 121.
~^^2^^ The Times, April 28, 1943, p. 4.
250 from the graves in Katyn Forest, we can arrive at the following definite conclusions:``6. The data of the legal and medical examination determined, without any shadow of doubt:
``(a) That the time of the shooting was autumn 1941.
``(b) The application by the German executioners, when shooting Polish prisoners of war, of the identical method--- a pistol shot in the nape of the neck-as used by them in the mass murders of the Soviet citizens in other towns, especially in Orel, Voronetz, Krasnodar and in Smolensk itself.
``7. The conclusions reache'd, after studying the affidavits and medico-legal examinations concerning the shooting of Polish military prisoners of war by Germans in the autumn of 1941, fully confirmed the material evidence and documents discovered in the Katyn graves. '
``8. By shooting the Polish prisoners of war in Katyn Forest, the German fascist invaders consistently realized their policy for the physical extermination of the Slav peoples.''^^1^^
On January 15, 1944, the evidence of the Nazi crimes in Katyn Forest was examined by a large group of Western journalists, including the Sunday Times correspondent Alexander Werth, later a prominent British historian. In his detailed review of Soviet-Polish relations during the war, Alexander Werth singled out some particulars of the Katyn massacre. He said, for example that "the Poles had been murdered with German bullets, a fact which-judging from his Diary-had greatly perturbed Goebbels"^^2^^ The authenticity of the facts in the Katyn massacre was also confirmed by the daughter of the U.S. Ambassador in _-_-_
~^^1^^ International Military Tribunal. Trial of the Major War Criminals. Volume VII. Published at Nuremberg, Germany, 1947, pp. 426--428. For more on the subject see: M. Monin, "On the History of the 'Katyn Affair'', Voenno-istorichesky zhurnal, No. 2, 1982, pp. 67--73.
~^^2^^ Alexander Werth, Russia at War 1941--1945. Barrie and Rockliff, London, 1964, p. 664. "In any case it is essential that this incident remain a top secret. ... If it were to come to the knowledge of the enemy the whole Katyn affairs would have to be dropped,'' Goebbels wrote in his diary (The Goebbels Diary, London, Hamish Hamilton, 1948, p. 276).
251 Moscow, Kathleen Harriman, who accompanied the Western journalists on their tour.The full report on the commission's findings and other materials on the Katyn massacre were made public in the press, and were later brought in evidence as official documents at the Trial of the Major War Criminals at Nuremberg in 1946. (Documents: USSR-54; USSR-507; 402-PS; USSR507/402-PS, and others.)^^1^^
Nevertheless, the U.S. State Department and different subversive anti-socialist centres operating in the West resurrected the Goebbels version of the Katyn events in order to inflame anti-socialist sentiment and to undermine the fraternal relations between the USSR and socialist Poland. In later years the counter-revolutionary leaders of Solidarity used the poisonous Goebbels lie to incite anti-Soviet and antigovernment sentiment among those Poles who were not conversant with the historical facts.
But the attempts of the enemies of Soviet-Polish friendship to wreck it, including the shameless speculation on the tragic fate of the Polish army officers murdered by the Nazis, are doomed. Soviet-Polish friendship is inviolable.
Another propaganda campaign, which has as its aim the whitewashing of Nazi crimes and the defamation of the Soviet Union, concerns the German prisoners of war. For the past ten years this campaign has been feeding on the 15-volume (22 books) collected documents published in the Federal Republic of Germany and entitled Concerning the History of the German Prisoners of War of the Second World War.^^2^^ The collection contains a lengthy account of the life of the German prisoners of war in the USSR, Yugoslavia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, the United States, Britain, France and some other countries. Seven volumes of this ``research'' are devoted to the life of German prisoners of war in the Soviet Union. By distorting facts and events, its authors try to prove that in the USSR German prisoners of war were _-_-_
^^1^^ International Military Tribunal. Trial of the Major War Criminal? Volumes VII, IX, XVII. Published at Nuremberg, Germany, 1947.
~^^2^^ Zur Geschichte der deutschen Kriegsgefangenen des 2. Weltkrieges. Munchen, 1962--1974. Bd. 1-15.
252 not treated in accordance with accepted legal standards, that their life in Soviet captivity was ``torture''. A similar account is given of the life of the German POWs in Poland, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia.The defeat of the Wehrmacht and the capture of prisoners, was the predictable result of Nazi aggression against the Soviet state. In spite of the most grievous crimes that the Nazis perpetrated on Soviet territory, the Soviet Union, guided by humanitarian principles in its treatment of the German POWs, strictly observed all relevant international agreements. With all the difficulties brought on by the war that the Nazis had forced upon the Soviet Union, the German and other POWs of the armies of the fascist bloc were provided with food, medical and other assistance.
On July 1, 1941, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR (the Soviet government) adopted "The Statute on Prisoners of War" which guaranteed them their lives, and defined the conditions of detainment.
This Statute was repeatedly confirmed in the orders of the Supreme Commander of the Soviet Armed Forces. For example, Order No. 55 of February 23, 1942, read in part, "The Red Army takes German officers and men prisoner if they surrender and preserves their lives''.^^1^^ On June 11, 1943, the CHQ C-in-C issued a directive as an addendum to the Statute. It defined privileges for those who had surrendered voluntarily: more and better food, accommodation in special camps situated in more favourable climatic zones, work in line with their profession, permission to mail letters to relatives, early return to their home country, or (if they so desire) to any other country, immediately after the end of the war. The Soviet command abided strictly by the terms set down in these documents. Deep in the Soviet rear the German prisoners of war were provided with all the necessities, and those who worked, with money.
Convincing proof of the humane treatment of the German soldiers, officers and generals in Soviet POW camps, and of the strict observance of international norms with regard _-_-_
^^1^^ Joseph Stalin, On the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, p. 48 (in Russian).
253 to POW status by the Soviet government and the Soviet command is the thousands of statements made openly and at different times by prisoners of war who came from different classes and social groups. Most of the POWs who made such statements were of German nationality.In a joint statement, a group of German generals and officers wrote, "...for close to two years we have had the opportunity to see different POW camps at first hand, and can say that these camps are situated in a wholesome environment and -make a good impression, both in appearance and in accommodations.... The prisoners of war are employed at different jobs depending on their ability to work and, wherever possible, in line with their profession.... The prisoners of war are not used in jobs that might be harmful to their health. They work 8-9 hours a day everywhere, and on Sundays, as a rule, have a day off. The condition of health of the POWs is fairly good, and the food is adequate. The prisoners of war working at Russian factories sometimes receive a considerable addition to their regular ration. The POWs express their gratitude for the sanitary and medical service they get from Russian and German doctors.... We have established and hereby declare that prisoners of war are treated in accordance with international agreements and customs. The POWs, soldiers and officers, are convinced that after the war they will return home in good health, unharmed and able to work''. The statement was signed by Lieutenant General Edler von Daniels, commander of the 376th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Helmuth Schlemmer, commander of the 14th Tank Corps, Lieutenant General Vincent Miiller, commander of the 12th Corps, Major General Dr. Otto Korfes, commander of the 295th Infantry Division, Colonel Dr. Albrecht Szimaitis, commander of the 305th Infantry Division, Major General Arno von Lenski, commander of the 24th Tank Division, and others. The authors of Concerning the History of German Prisoners of War... turn & blind eye to such statements and peddle their own stories, disguised as "the truth'', about the "horrors of. the Russian POW camps''.
The authors attempts .to distort the truth about the German POWs in the USSR are meant to justify the brutal 254 treatment meted out by the Nazis and their underlings to Soviet prisoners of war. The crimes committed by the Nazis against Soviet prisoners of war are well known. They were condemned by the International Tribunal at Nuremberg, a fact which the said authors could not avoid mentioning. The authors, however, insist that crimes against Soviet prisoners of war were ``incidental'' and were not typical of the German prison camps. But the facts speak to the contrary. History does not know any more terrible crimes than those committed by the fascists in the last world war. Oswiecim, Maidanek, Treblinka, Dachau, Mauthausen, Buchenwald, Ravensbriick- these and other centres in the Nazi industry of death, where more than 11 million citizens of the Soviet Union, Poland, France, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Holland, Belgium and other countries were exterminated, will never be forgotten.
Heinz Kiihnrich, a military historian from the German Democratic Republic, cites data on numerous killings of Soviet prisoners of war in camps. "The destruction of Soviet prisoners of war was on a truly tremendous scale. Many thousands of them fell victim to the fascist beasts.... In only a few weeks, 7,200 Soviet POWs were shot in Buchenwald, 8,320 in Oswiecim, 18,000 in Sachsenhausen, 3,135 in Mauthausen.''^^1^^
The policy of the official bodies of the Nazi Reich and of the Wehrmacht command for Soviet prisoners of war lays bare the man-hating substance of fascism. This policy is part of the genocide plan meant for the Soviet people. But the falsifiers of history ignore the truth. For them it simply does not matter. Joachim Hoffmann (FRG) simply denies the existence of these facts and writes shamelessly that the conditions in the POW camps were "sufficiently good to preserve the life and health of their inmates''.
The Japanese military were just as brutal. One of the orders of the Japanese command produced at the International Tribunal in Tokyo said that the prisoners of war "are _-_-_
~^^1^^ Heinz Kiihnrich, Der K'/,~Staat. Rolle und Entwicklung der faschistischen Konzentrationslager 1933 bis 1945. Dietz Verlag, Berlin, 1960, S. 58.
255 to be destroyed either one at a time, or in groups, by bombing, poisoning with toxic smoke, chemicals, or by drowning, decapitating or by other means, depending on the situation''. In the O'Donnell Camp alone, not less than 27,000 Americans and Filipinos died between April and December 1942. Beatings and torture of all kinds, the murder without trial of those POWs who had tried to escape constitute only a small part of the military crimes proof of which was brought in evidence at the Tokyo Tribunal. The merciless savage regime prevailed in all the camps for prisoners of war and civilian internees on Japanese-occupied territory.^^1^^Nevertheless, efforts are being made in some countries to make people forget the horror of the fascist scourge. For example, a fascist concentration museum-camp was recently opened in Britain so that lovers of the morbid could experience the titillating sensation of living for three days in ``real'' concentration-type barracks, sleeping on bunks watched by guards in SS uniform, and leave with the impression that surviving such an ``ordeal'' was easy enough. This gimmick thought up by some smart British operators is a mockery of history and the memory of those countless victims of the war, including many of those Britons who lost their lives in the German and Japanese death camps.
Dante Cruicchi, mayor of the Italian city of Marzabotto, says that for more than twenty years now a shameless campaign has been going on in the Federal Republic of Germany and Austria in an attempt to negate the tragedy of his native city whose residents were brutally murdered by the SS in September 1944. The advocates of the fascist criminals have published two books-^4 Lie about Marzabotto and Marzabotto-Deception of the World (in German). The West German newspaper Die Welt carried an article describing the war criminal and butcher W. Raeder as a brave soldier who "has fallen victim to a conspiracy of the Italian Communists''. The reactionary French weekly Rivarol has described the murder of millions of inmates of the Nazi concentration camps as "a fairy tale''. The Paris magazine _-_-_
~^^1^^ L. N. Smimov, Y. V. Zaitsev, The Tokyo Trial. Moscow, 1978, pp. 524, 52.5 (in Russian).
256 L'Express has carried an interview which implied that there were no gas chambers, and that "if anything got killed, it was only lice''.The propaganda campaign against the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials of major war criminals should be viewed much in the same context. The Nuremberg Trial (November 20, 1945-October 1, 1946) and the Tokyo Trial (May 3, 1946-November 12, 1948) laid bare the man-hating nature of German fascism and Japanese militarism, their bloody crimes, and their monstrous plans to annihilate whole nations. The judgement of the international tribunal in Nuremberg stressed: "To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differring only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole".^^1^^ Eleven major German and seven Japanese war criminals, including former leaders of the government, the armed forces and diplomatic services were sentenced to death and executed by hanging for the unleashing of the war and for other grievous crimes before humanity. Others were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.
The judgements passed by these tribunals give no peace to present-day warmongers. So they have commissioned some Western historians to take on the job of discrediting the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials. Here are a few samples of what they write. "All the lies about their [the convicted criminals] guilt m starting the war are aimed not only at the 'Prussian militarism' of the past, but particularly at the defence capability of the Federal Republic, and at the German Bundeswehr,"^^2^^ writes Heinrich Hartle (FRG). The French publication Lectures Francoises addresses young readers who "did not know the terrible war years" and "who have had the truth concealed from them" with this message: "Those who were executed in Nuremberg were men whom the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal. Vol. XXII. Published at Nuremberg, Germany 1948, p. 427.
~^^2^^ Heinrich Hartle, Die Kriegsschuld der Sieger. Churchills, Roosevelts, und Stalins Verbrechen gegen den Weltfrieden. Verlag K. W. Schtttz Kg. Oldendorf, 1971, S. 49--50.
257 tribunal, set up by the victors, pronounced guilty for preparing and unleashing a conflict which shook the West. But the convicted nazi criminals were not the only ones responsible for the war. There were also others whom the Supreme Court did not try''. According to this pro-fascist journal, the real culprits were the Communists who were assisted by Churchill, Eden, Reignot and Roosevelt who had ``pro-Soviet'' policies.^^1^^However, it is not only the neofascists who attack the Allied decision to put the German and Japanese war criminals on trial. Criticism of this sort is getting increasingly strident in the works of American, British and French historians and even in school textbooks. One such textbook published in the United States denies the legality of the Allied decision to punish the war criminals because, it says, "an individual could not be held accountable for violating laws for which statutes, penalties, and means of enforcement had not existed at the time the acts were committed".^^2^^ This ``argument'' is not valid because even in those days there were international legal norms which stated liability for actions that went against the laws and customs of war. These norms were set down in the international conventions adopted at The Hague Conferences in 1899 and 1907 and at the Geneva Conference in 1929. In 1943 the Allies signed the Moscow Declaration on the responsibility of the Nazis for their crimes. As a follow-up to this declaration, the Allies, at the Crimea Conference in 1945, formulated a decision to punish war criminals. All these documents provided a sound legal basis for putting the war criminals on trial. But the bourgeois falsifiers of history conceal, for obvious reasons, this aspect of the problem, because it exposes their attempts to discredit the trials and to rehabilitate the criminals.
For many years now a great many books, articles, memoirs and other publications about the Nazi Reich, and about Hitler and his underlings have appeared in the United States and in Western Europe. This writing is markedly different _-_-_
~^^1^^ "Les causes cachees de la Deuxieme Guerre Mondiale." Lectures Francoises, Numero special. Mai 1975, p. 5.
~^^2^^ John Edward Wiltz, The Search for Identity. Modern American History. J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, etc., 1978, p. 682.
258 from the publications that appeared in the first postwar decades. At that time, historians attempted to explain Germany's defeat by listing the Fiihrer's mistakes, whereas now they are out to rehabilitate Hitler and fascism in general."Hitler has remained the Fiihrer, and not only for the Germans,'' writes the West German magazine Der Freiwillige. ``~~He became, directly or indirectly, a Fiihrer for all Europeans who, after 1940, lost their faith in the corrupt democracies of their countries and recognised a new principle of leadership there.'' The West German newspaper Deutsche National-Zeitung has run a series of articles under the headline "The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler'', in which the Nazi regime in Germany was called "a blessing for the German people' and Hitler was described as "a fighter for delivery from communism".^^1^^ Bourgeois falsifiers of history keep talking about the "fatal mistake" of Churchill and Roosevelt, who "failed to appreciate" Hitler, who might have triumphed over "Asian Bolshevism" and saved Europe.
Significantly, this campaign for the rehabilitation of fascism, and particularly the Wehrmacht, has also engulfed the West German armed forces. An official document, "The Bundeswehr and Traditions'', requires the commanders of all units and formations to propagandise the glorious traditions and the gallantry of the officers and men of the Wehrmacht, who must serve "as the ideal for the young generation of Bundeswehr soldiers''.
``To preserve traditions means not only to recall the past, but also to make the past fruitful and useful for us today, se that it can help us stand firm now and in the future,'' this from General Ulrich von Maiziere, one of the leaders of the Bundeswehr.^^2^^
For a number of years now, brochures have come out weekly in the FRG under the general title "Stories of the Past. From the History of the Second World War'', written specially for Bundeswehr soldiers and the civilian youth. These brochures carry material about the war experiences _-_-_
~^^1^^ "Das Leben und Sterben Adolf Hitler''. Deutsche National-Zeitung, Juni 22,Juni 29, 1973.
~^^2^^ Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, April 18, 1970,8. 14.
259 of the Wehrmacht and give a popular account of the wars of conquest waged by Nazi Germany. The brochures also speak about the ``heroic'' deeds of the officers and men of the Hitler Reich. Nazi documentaries made during the Second World War glorify the Wehrmacht and are often shown on West German television.The Bundeswehr command names army barracks after former Nazi generals and officers, among them criminals of the war. The barracks at Mittenwald bears the name of General Kiibler, whom a Yugoslav court sentenced to death in 1947 for his crimes in Poland, the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and Northern Italy. The name of the war criminal General Konrad was given to a Bundeswehr barracks in Bad Reichenhall. And there are many more such examples.
Some of the barracks are named after cities and areas which, after the Second World War, became part of Poland, the USSR and Czechoslovakia. Such geographical names as Pomerania, East Prussia, Ostmark, Tannenberg, Breslau are expected, as the Bundeswehr leaders believe, to inculcate in West German soldiers the spirit of revanche. The newspaper of the West German Communists reported in January 1981 that in the barracks of the Bundeswehr in Degendorf am Inn, soldiers are shown a ``grofideutsche'' map which includes the German Democratic Republic and some areas of Poland, Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union.^^1^^
The Bundeswehr command encourages in every way the contacts of its units and formations with organisations of former SS-men and the ex-servicemen of the Wehrmacht. Such contacts and meetings remind the young soldiers of the ``heroic'' martial days of the German army. In 1981 a memorial medal was struck in honour of the Nazi Gross Admiral Doenitz. Commemorating this event, some newspapers in the FRG wrote that the death of Karl Doenitz "removed from our midst an outstanding personality in German history''. Thus the war criminal Doenitz, whom Hitler called "a National-Socialist to the marrow of his bones'', and who was sentenced by the Nuremberg Tribunal to ten years' imprisonment, is now painted as a ``hero''. _-_-_
^^1^^ Unsere Zeit, 12. Januar 1981,S. 1.
260 The Deutsche National-Zeitung set the record straight when it said that the struggle against communism today cannot be convincing enough without the due recognition of those who, arms in hand, fought against communism yesterday.The tenacity of fascist ideas arouses much concern among the public, and gives food for thought to some of the present leaders of the Federal Republic of Germany.
The former minister of defence and later Chancellor of the Federal Republic, Helmut Schmidt, wrote that "the Bundeswehr, as no other army in German history since 1813, reflects the realities of our society. This does not mean we should close our eyes to the existence in the Bundeswehr of certain backward-looking tendencies, derived from bad traditions, which are not in full accord with the norms of life and behaviour in our democratic social order''.^^1^^
Helmut Schmidt's statement refutes the contention of some Western historians that the polemics against fascism must be ended, that the whole question of fascism must be treated fairly and without bias because, in their words, fascism has become history, and in present-day conditions poses no real threat to bourgeois democracy. They also say that fascism compromised itself ``sufficiently'' in the Second World War, and therefore there is no point in getting excited over the activities of the neo-Nazis.
This thesis is fraught with great danger. Back in the 1920s bourgeois experts and people whose opinion carried weight in public circles were rather sceptical about Hitler and his party getting into power. In the 1930s the protagonists of appeasement tried to convince world public opinion that it was still possible to come to terms with Nazi Germany. The tragic consequences of this short-sighted policy are well known. Eric Roussel, an observer for the French newspaper Le Monde, wrote on May 8, 1981: "Thirty-six years after the end of the Second World War, _-_-_
~^^1^^ Helmut Schmidt, The Balance of Power. Germany's Peace Policy and the Super Power. London, Kimber, 1971, p. 243.
261 we again are being haunted by the ghost of nazism revived by absurd and treacherous propaganda whose aim is to justify and even laud Hitler's barbarity. The obvious facts known to all sober-minded people have been dismissed by a handful of fanatics who have usurped and abused the name of historian.''^^1^^The Second World War ended in the defeat of fascism, but it failed to extirpate the class roots of fascism, which would have made its resurgence impossible. Fascism was and still is the product of the capitalist system when its contradictions are exacerbated to the utmost. It would be wrong to ignore the danger of resurgence of fascism, the gradual transmutation of the bourgeois-democratic regimes into fascist regimes, the establishment of openly military and terrorist dictatorships in some countries. Events in Chile, the Republic of South Africa and certain other countries show how imperialist reactionaries can use these dictatorial regimes in their struggle against the mass democratic movement.
Neofascist parties or groups are today active in the FRG, Italy, France and other West European countries, also in the United States. They have become an influential force in certain Latin American countries and are stepping up their activity in Africa and Asia. Warmongers have borrowed fascist ideas such as rampant anti-communism, adulation of violence and militarism, racism, the right of "a chosen nation" to dominate over all other peoples. In its much touted drive to protect its "vital interests'', the United States has mounted a propaganda campaign to justify American interference in the internal affairs of other coun-, tries, and is building up the myth of the special mission of the United States to lead the world.
The leader of the American Communists, Gus Hall, has said that "...from the very beginning the ideological essence of U.S. imperialism has been racist great power chauvinism".^^2^^ This assessment holds true to this day.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Le Monde, 8 mai, 198!, p. 1.
^^2^^ Gus Hall, Imperialism Today. International Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 143.
262Over the past several years many Western historians have called into question the legitimacy of the borders established as a result of the Second World War, and particularly the borders of People's Poland along the rivers Oder and Neisse. What are they trying to prove?
The heads of government of the USSR, the USA and Britain, at the Berlin (Potsdam) Conference in 1945, came to an agreement that "the former German territories east of a line running from the Baltic Sea immediately west of Swinemuende, and thence along the Oder River to the confluence of the western Neisse River, and along the western Neisse to the Czechoslovak frontier, including the portion of East Prussia not placed under the administration of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in accordance with the understanding reached at this conference, and including the area of the former free city of Danzig, shall be under the administration of the Polish State, and for such purposes should not be considered as part of the Soviet zone of occupation in Germany".^^1^^
Right after the end of the war, the revanchist and profascist elements in me FRG, with the connivance of the American and British occupation authorities, mounted a vociferous campaign in an effort to prove that the Oder-Neisse frontiers were illegal. In 1946 a former Nazi diplomat, Georg Vogel, drew up a foreign policy memorandum on behalf of the Land government of Hessen. This document contained the demand not to recognise the territorial changes that had been effected as a result of the Second World War. Vogel's argument was that "Germany did not sign the Berlin agreements''. No secret was made of hopes for support by "the influential American and British quarters which are not averse to the idea of readjusting the existing frontiers in Germany's favour''.^^2^^
For more than three decades the problem of frontiers in _-_-_
~^^1^^ The World Almanac and Book of Facts for 1947. New York WorldTelegram, New York, 1947, p. 527.
^^2^^ Georg Vogel, Diplomat unter Hitler und Adenauer. Econ Verlag, Dusseldorf, 1969,5. 131--133.
263 Europe has been treated in Western history books as "the unresolved problem of the Second World War'',^^1^^ with the "illegitimate Oder-Neisse line" being one of the most frequently raised points.^^2^^An American public school textbook published in 1978 says that "the Oder-Neisse line is still an unresolved issue in European politics".^^3^^
For a long time, the Federal Republic of Germany did not recognise the results of the Second World War and the actual situation in Europe. But in the 1970s, its old policies underwent considerable changes. When the coalition government of the Social Democratic Party of Germany and the Free Democratic Party came to power it decided to normalise relations with the socialist countries, which meant that Bonn had opted for a more realistic line.
In an agreement signed in 1970, the Federal Republic of Germany and the USSR declared the territorial inviolability of all national frontiers in Europe, including the Oder-Neisse border and the border between the FRG and the GDR. This meant that the Federal Republic of Germany recognised the German Democratic Republic, and that the Bonn government formally renounced its revanchist plans for revising the results of the Second World War. In later years these important provisions were reaffirmed in the treaties between the FRG and the GDR (1972), between the FRG and the Polish People's Republic (1973), and between the FRG and the C/SR (1973).
Yet in spite of all that, the revanchist campaign continues.
Demands for a revision of the results of the Second World War and of the decisions on the Oder-Neisse border are the stock-in-trade of the West German neofascists who are pressing for the return of the "eastern territories'', and for "the revival of the Great German Empire''. Ideas of revanche and a revision of the Oder-Neisse line also _-_-_
^^1^^ Kann Europa abriisten? Friedenspolitische Optionen fur die siebziger Jahre. Carl Hanser Verlag, Miinchen, 1973, S. 22.
~^^2^^ Der Spiegel, N. 13, 21. Marz, 1977, S. 174--188.
~^^3^^ Marvin Perry, Man's Unfinished Journey. A World History. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston, 1978, p. 752.
264 find place in some of government policies. In 1981 the government ministers of education of some West German provinces adopted a decision in accordance with which West German school textbooks should present the borders of the German Reich as they existed on December 31, 1937, and give the German names of that time to the Polish and Soviet cities that lie within these borders.In view of the activisation of the anti-socialist elements in the Polish People's Republic, which operated in accordance with- scenarios worked out by the special services of the imperialist states and of NATO, the West German revanchists stepped up their propaganda for the annexation of Poland's western territories. In January 1981, the West German neofascist organisation called AKON (Aktion OderNeisse) circulated a leaflet which says that "the wave of strikes in Poland has opened up a new phase in the struggle for the return of the German eastern territories''. The authors of this leaflet apparently wanted to take advantage of the events in Poland in order to "prove the inability of the Polish state to administer the German eastern territories''.^^1^^
The provocative attempts to get a revision of the European borders established as a result of the Second World War are, of course, doomed. The inviolability of the frontiers of the Polish People's Republic and the German Democratic Republic is guaranteed by international law and by the entire might of the socialist community of nations. However, the effect of these provocations for reviving revanchist sentiments should not be underestimated.
The book markets in the United States and Western Europe are flooded with all sorts of literature ranging from low-priced paperbacks to scholarly studies in hard cover which give their own versions of the outbreak of a nuclear missile war. There is a number of ``scenarios'', _-_-_
^^1^^ Unsere Zeit, 12.Januar 1981, S. 1.
265 and more are coming, on the subject. In these the role of the aggressor is always played by the Warsaw Treaty countries, and especially the Soviet Union. The reader is literally buried under an avalanche of ``what-ifs'' and ``this-is-hows'', with nuclear missiles raining down on Europe and America, Soviet tanks breaking through to the English Channel, Japan destroyed in a nuclear holocaust, the Soviet navy threatening Australia and New Zealand, and many other ``authentic'' details of coming world catastrophe.One such ``scenario'' has the action set in the early 1950s. "World War III has begun.... The Allies ... make a brief stand on the Rhine. But the front collapses on 3 January when Marshal Malinovsky's front establishes a bridgehead near Wesel-oddly enough in the same area where Montgomery crossed in World War II.... Throughout Western Europe Communist action armies come out into the open, using World War II weapons and explosives stored for this moment.... On January 6 the Red flag is hoisted over Paris and the other Western European capitals.''^^1^^
The West German writer Friedrich Hitzer provides a long list of books published on this subject in the FRG: The Russians On the March; They WUl Come; The Red Flag over Bonn; A March against the Federal Republic; Defenceless Europe. "In my country people come under a daily barrage of anti-communism and anti-Sovietism'',^^2^^ writes Hitzer.
In 1979 the book market in Paris was graced by Euroshima, the authors of which apparently sought to frighten the readers with the bogey of "the Soviet military threat'', and implant in them the thought that in its present ``defenceless'' state, Europe is doomed to the same fate as Hiroshima. "From Washington to Teheran, from Kinshasa to Pretoria, the pillars of her defence have given _-_-_
~^^1^^ Dropshot. The United States Plan for War with the Soviet Union in 7957. Edited by Anthony Cave Brown. The Dial Press-James Wade, New York, 1978, p. 250.
^^2^^ Pravda, July 16, 1979.
266 way...''^^1^^ The authors of The Soviet Army Lands in Japan and its sequel The ``Minsk'' Goes into Battle published in Japan give their version of events that "are sure to happen" in the 1980s: the occupation of Japan by Soviet troops, the war waged by Japan and the United States against the USSR. The list of such books published in the West could go on indefinitely. Regrettably, this spate of anti-Soviet literature has left its imprint, as was noted by Newsweek: "With Washington on a new, stop-- theSoviets spending spree, ... for the defense industry that means prosperity ahead''.^^2^^At the same time, books with a fair and unbiased interpretation of history are sure to come under attack in the West. An example of such persecution is the book, A Study of the History of Japanese-Russian Relations at the End of the Bakumatsu Period, written by Professor E. Koriyama and published in 1980. Using archival materials in the Russian and Japanese languages, Professor Koriyama provides convincing proof that the Kurile Islands, including Kunashir and Iturup, cannot by rights be regarded as Japanese territory, and that the attempts of Japanese politicians to prove the contrary are futile. Typically, the Reagan Administration hindered the publication in the United States of a fundamental Soviet study, A History of the Second World War 1939--1945. Also obstacles were raised to prevent the TV film The Unknown War from being shown in the United States. There are many other similar facts.
The reactionaries, whose actions today are reminiscent of the book-burning orgies of the Nazis, are filled with blind malice for fear that the truth will emerge about the great feat of courage of the Soviet people who fought shoulder to shoulder with other nations in the anti-Hitler coalition against fascist aggression.
In a speech at the 34th Session of the UN General Assembly, Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko stressed _-_-_
~^^1^^ Rene Cagntit, Guy Doly, Pascal Fontaine, Euroshima, Construire I'Rurope de la defense. Les Editions Media, Paris, 1979, p. .5.
~^^2^^ Newsweek, February 4, 1980, p. 39.
267 the danger of the growing propaganda of the cult of war by the more reactionary militarist forces. "We know that before the aggressors who started the Second World War made their guns speak, there were many years of war propaganda, punctuated by calls for redividing the map of Europe and the world in accordance with the plans of the aggressors,'' he said. "The Soviet Union is mindful of this today, because there are forces still active that believe they can cajole people into thinking in terms of war and an arms build-up.''^^1^^What results of the Second World War would reactionary historians have liked to see? A reply to this question was given many years ago by Hanson Baldwin, the then war observer for The New York Times. He wrote: "The great opportunity of the democracies (read "US imperialism"-^ MfAor) for establishing a stable peace came on June 22, 1941, when Germany invaded Russia, but we muffed the chance."^^2^^ Cynical but frank. But it was not a matter of the U.S. muffing a chance. It was the Soviet Union that foiled the plans of the imperialists. The USSR withstood that ordeal and emerged as the decisive force that defeated the aggressor. Herein lies the main universal significance of the Second World War, and its lessons for today.
_-_-_~^^1^^ A. A. Gromyko, For the Security of Nations, for Peace on Earth. A speech at the U.N. 34th General Assembly. September 25, 1979. Moscow, 1979, p. 5 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Hanson Baldwin, The Great Mistakes of the War. London, 1950, pp. 10--11.
[268] __ALPHA_LVL1__ CONCLUSIONThe U.S. task force in the Persian Gulf in the autumn of 1979 during the U.S.-Iranian hostage crisis consisted of a score or so of big warships. The names of some of them evoked the days of the Second World War: the Eisenhower, the Coral Sea, the Midway, the Tarawa, and others. At a later stage, these American ships were joined by the British destroyer Coventry. This armada made a show of force on several occasions, demonstrating the very real threat of the imperialist policy from positions of strength. It often happens today that names dating back to the time when nations fought against the fascist invaders are used as camouflage for imperialist aggression. That happened in Korea and Vietnam, in the Middle East and the South Atlantic. The history and the results of the Second World War left their mark on many postwar events, though they may differ vastly in their effect on world development and people's lives.
Today the reader of books on the history of the Second World War wants to find answers to many questions concerning the reasons for the bloody conflict of the peoples and who was responsible for it, what brought about the victory and at what cost, how much the different states contributed, what lessons of the war we can benefit from and what responsibility we have to future generations, what possibility there is of averting a new world conflagration, and how to strengthen world peace.
Books about the Second World War written by reactionary historians and motivated by anti-communism do not give 269 a truthful answer to these questions. These authors have built up an edifice of myths about the last war aimed at justifying today's aggressive policy of imperialism, and lulling the vigilmce of the peoples.
Imperialist circles have been defeated in social battles, have lost their colonies and seen more and more countries reject the capitalist system. They witness the achievements of the socialist community, and seen the growing influence of communist parties and other democratic forces inside the capitalist countries. To all this they have only one response-stepping up military preparations. By circulating stories about the "Soviet threat'', they hope to call attention away from the arms drive, which has reached unprecedented proportions in the NATO countries, and especially in the United States. No small part in this propaganda campaign is played by reactionary historians.
Their fiercest attacks have been provoked by the steadily rising prestige of the Soviet policy of peace, which more and more people in the West today acknowledge. Of special importance is the Soviet government's Peace Programme for the 1980s aimed at averting a new world war.
In accordance with the decisions of the 26th Congress of the CPSU (1981) the Soviet government has worked out and brought to the knowledge of the world public a number of proposals aimed at curbing the arms race. These proposals were made in the course of top-level bilateral contacts, at the U.N. General Assemblies, at meetings between Soviet leaders and prominent public figures from [other countries, at congresses of social-- political organisations, at public meetings and holiday . demonstrations.
It would be well to recall two Soviet initiatives which drew a particularly wide response throughout the world: the Soviet Union's pledge not to be the first to use nuclear weapons, and a ``freeze'' on nuclear weapons as the first step' towards their reduction, and eventually ultimate dismantling. As a follow-up to this initiative, the Soviet Union submitted a proposal to impose a moratorium on the siting in Europe of new medium-range 270 nuclear weapons systems of both the NATO countries and the Soviet Union, which amounted to a freeze-- qualitative and quantitative-on the existing level of such means of delivery.
But the ruling elite in the United States and-on its orders-in other NATO countries, obsessed as they are by the unrealistic desire to upset nuclear parity and achieve military superiority over the USSR, have rejected the Soviet peace proposals.
The Plenary Meeting of the Central Committee of the CPSU held in February 1984 reaffirmed the burning desire of the Soviet people for peace. "As a great socialist power the Soviet Union is fully aware of its responsibility to the peoples for preserving and strengthening peace. We are open to peaceful, mutually beneficial cooperation with states on all continents. We are for the peaceful settlement of all disputed international problems through serious, equal and constructive talks. The USSR will in full measure cooperate with all states prepared with practical deeds to help lessen international tension and create an atmosphere of trust in the world. In other words, with those who will really pursue a policy leading not to preparing for war but to strengthening the foundations of peace. And we believe that to this end full use should be made of all the existing levers, including, of course, such a one as the United Nations Organisation, which was founded precisely for preserving and strengthening peace.''^^1^^
There are mighty forces in the world, with all the necessary means to prevent a new world war, to curb any would-be aggressor and-if he dares start a war-to give him a crushing rebuff and foil his criminal plans.
What are these forces?~
The powerful socialist community of nations which has placed its political, economic and military might at the service of peace;~
The international working class and its vanguard-the communist parties-which work consistently to combat the threat of a new war;~
_-_-_^^1^^ Pravda, February 14, 1984.
271The national liberation movement which is fighting against neocolonialism, and for national independence and social progress;~
The mass movement for peace which has forced the imperialist to reckon with the will of hundreds of millions of people resolved to win peace for the world.
Military catastrophe must never happen again. The history of the tragedy and triumph of the freedom-loving peoples in the years of the Second World War has demonstrated the importance of knowing and understanding its lessons.
Soviet people firmly believe that by joining efforts, the nations will be able to win over the military threat, to preserve and strengthen peace, to ensure the right to life for every human being on earth.
[272] Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1984/WWII279/20070928/279.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2007.10.05) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ __ALPHA_LVL1__ NAME INDEX [273] ~ [274]Adamthwaite, Anthony-91 Aichinger, Wilfried-44, 45 Andropov, Y.V.-202, 271 Antonov, A. I.-214, 219 Arnim von, General -15 7 Aron, Raymond-197 Astor-35
B
Baer, George W.-37, 44 Baldwin, Haiison-92, 124, 159,
162, 164, 201, 268 Bariety, Jacques-58 Barnet, Richard J.-28 Barthou, Louis-34 Battaglia, Roberto-1 LI Bauer, Eddy-161 Beaufre, Andre-71, 72 Beitzell, Robert-160 Benes, Eduard-46, 47 Bernstein, David-99 Bevin, Ernest-184 Blum, L6on-41 Blumentritt, Gunther-108 Bock, Fedor von-124 Bohlen, Charles-143, 235 Bonnet, Georges-43 Borg, Dorothy-51, 52 Braddick, Henderson B.-37, 42, 43
Bragdon, Henry W.-80, 81 Brezhnev, L. I.-119,224, 226, 236 Buchanan, R.-181 Bullitt, William-144 Burdenko, N. N.-250 Burke, Arleigh-215 Burnett, Charles-68 Butler, J.R.M.-118 Byrnes, James F.-227
Caidin, Martin-134--137 Calvocoressi, Peter-90, 92, 95 Carrere d'Encausse, Helene-194,
198Carter, James-242 Cartier, Raymond^ 190 Chamberlain, Neville-35, 36, 59,
62, 70
Charles XII-248 Chatfield, Alfred Emle Monta-
cute-61, 63, 65, 67 Chiang Kai-shek-96 Choibalsan-156 Churchill, Winston Sponrcr- '""
59, 86, 95, 111, ! ii'. I ! " i
145, 166, 185, 230, 233, 236,
238, 250, 258, 259 Chuikov, V.I.-217 Clark, Alan-186, 197 Clarke, Jeffrey I.-88
J y
275Clausewitz, Carl von---18 Clayton, William-192 Clemenceau, Georges-31 Colmer, William-192 Commager, Henry S.-181 Cooper, Leonard-116, 248 Constantini, Aime-174 Craig, William-121, 124, 126,
128, 201 Cruicchi, Dante-256
Forstmeier, Friedrich---77 Frankland, N.-164, 165 Frederick the Great-108 Freund, MichaeI-22, 81, 92, 233 Friessner, Hans-201--202 Fujiwara, A.-152 Fuller, J.F.C.-1.57
Heywood, T. L.-64, 68
Hesse, Fritz-93
Higgins, Trumbull-113, 197
Hillgruber, Andreas-74
Himmler, Heinrich-198
Hitler, Adolf-21--23,^26, 30, 34, 38, 39, 43, 46, 58, 59, 72, 76, 79, 81, 83, 92, 94, 95, 105--107, 113--15, 121, 123, 124, 131--33, 136, 148, 164, 168, 183, 186, 189, 198, 207, 219, 236, 246,248, 259--61
Hitzer, Friedrich-266
Hobbs, Richard-233
Hodza, Milan-47
Hoffmann, Joachim.-203--204,255
Hoffmann, Max-226
Hoover, Herbert-237
Hopkins, Harry-183, 187, 235
Hore-Belisha, Leslie-63
Hornbeck, Stanley K.-101
Howe, Quincy-181
Howell, Edgar M.-207
Hubatsh, Walther-82
Hull, Cordell-97, 100, 101
Husak, Gustav-149
Kennan, George F.-19, 47, 151,
152Kennedy, Joseph P.-73 Kerillis, Henri de-85 Kettenacker, Sothar-59 Khmelnitsky, Bogdan-194, 195 Kleine-Anlbrandt, W. Laird-33 Klink, Ernst.-130 Knox, Frank-97, 100 Kojima, Noboru-49 Kolko, Gabriel-99, 143, 237 Kolko,Joyce-237 Kolkowicz, Roman-226 Konev, I.S.-140 Konrad-260 Korfes, Otto-254 Koriyama, E.-267 Koselleck, Reinhart-15 Kosygin, A. N.-185 Krammer, Arnold-54 Kravchenco, G.S.-177 Ktibler, General-260 Kuhnrich, Heinz-255 Kunavin, G.P.-141, 142 Kutuzov, M.I.-195 Kuznetsov, N. G.-156
D
Daladier, Edouard-64, 67 Dallin, David-225 Daniels, Edler von-254 Dirksen, Herbert von-64 Divine, Robert A.-186 Dmitry Donskoi-197 Doenitz, Karl-260 Dollinger, Hans-158 Doumenc, Joseph-62, 69, 73 Dowling, C.-164 Drax, Reginald-62--70 Dupuy, Trevour-115, 123, 130,
158, 210 Duroselle, Jean-Baptiste-43, 44,
46, 71
Eden, Anthony-102, 258 Eisenhower, Dwight-10,158,160,
189, 238
Engels, Frederick-12 Erickson, Edgar I.-183 Eubank, Keith-29, 36, 39, 46, 48
H
Hacha, Emil-61
Haider, Franz-10, 91, 93,117, 128
Halifax, Lord-35, 59, 61, 63, 65,
68Hall, Gus-262 Hamilton (Lord)-84, 95 Harriman, Averell-188, 192, 235 Harriman, Kathleen-252 Hartle, Heinrich-30, 78, 257 Hattori, Takushiro-10, 49 Heis, Ch.-162 Helmdach, Erich-93, 207 Herrick, Robert W.-215 Herring, George, C.-189 Hess, E.-197
276Fajon, Etienn-91 Falkenhayn, Erich von-121 Farrar, L.LJr.-21 Feis, Herbert-101 Fischer, Louis-2 7, 246 Fleming, Nicholas-81 276
Ibarruri, Dolores-203 Ibamiri, Ruben Ruiz-203 Irving, David-94 Ivanov, S.P.-219
K
Kalinin, M. I.-111,200, 209 Keitel, Wilhelm-123, 206
Gaddis, John Lewis-192 Gallagher, Matthew P.-123 Gambiez, Fernand---202 Gamelin, Maurice-39, 71, 83, 88 Gardner, Lloyd C.-99 Garthoff, Raymond L.-27, 28,
151, 155
Gaulle, Charles de-10, 112 Girault, Rene-179 Glasebock, W.-93 Goebbels, Josef-193, 249, 251 Goring, Hermann-72 Grebing, Helga-23, 24 Greenfield, Kent Roberts-144,
145, 152, 153 Grenier, Fernand-91, 111 Gromyko, A. A.-5, 242, 267 Grossmith, Frederick-90 Gwyer,J.M.A.-118
Jacobsen, Hans-Adolf-35, 97,
141, 158
Jodie, Alfred-81, 123 Jonas, Manfred-143 Jones, Robert-183 Juin, Marecha!-221
Lafore, Laurence - 21, 34--36,
38--41
Langley, Harold-143 Laqueur, Walter-6 Laval, Pierre-34, 90 Leckie, Robert-21 Lee, Dwight E.-35 Lenin, V.I.-12, 13, 18,31,32,50,
146, 152, 173, 176, 178, 193,
202, 222, 223, 229 Lenski, Arno von-254 Liddell Hart, Basil H.-94, 160,
165Lloyd George, David-31, 33, 99 Loewenheim, Francis L.-143 Lothian, Lord-35 Lyttelton, Oliver-144
M
MacArthur, Douglas-112, 135, 151
277MacCloskey, Monro-94 Maiziere, Uirich von-259 Malinovsky, R. Y.-266 Manstein, Erich von-125, 132,
226Maniulsky, D. £.-55 Marshall, George C.-152, 182,
189Marshall, S.L.A.-149 Marx, Karl-12 Masalov, N.- 147 Maser, Werner---23 Maule, Henry-164 McCutchen, Samuel P.-80 Mead, Margaret-14 Mee, Charles L.-J43 Mellenthin, Friedrich-131 Messerschmidt, Manfred-25 Michel, Henri-10, 162,221 Molotov, V. M.-67, 68 Montgomery, Bernard-135, 158,
266Morgenthau, Henry-97 Moriuo, Hayato-49 Morison, Samuel Eliot-162 Morris, Richard 131 Morton, Louis-97--99, 151, 162,
228Mourin, Maxime-188 Miiller, Vincent-254 Mussolini, Benito-21, 37, 44
Pachter, Henry M.-182
Pallasse-47
Palmer, Dave-24 7
Patton, George-135
Paulus, Friedrich-122, 125, 133,
220Perkins, Dexter-20 Petain, Henry Ph.-90 Peter the Great-194 Petrov, Y.-226 Pieck, Wilhelm-55, 230 Piekalkiewicz, Janusz - 95 Pitt, B.-121 Pogue, Forrest C.-62 Potyomkin, V. P.-250
278Saage, Richard-24 Saito, Takashi-49 Salisbury, Harrison-165, 212
Schlemmer, H.-254
Schmidt, Helmut-261
Schroeder, Paul-100, 101
Seaton, Albert-183
Seeds, William-66--69
Sergius-196
Seth, Ronald-127
Shirer, William L.-42, 43
Sigal, Leon-242
Sikorski, Wladyslaw-250
Simon, Sir John-34
Stachiewicz, Waclaw-71
Stalin, J.V.-77, 112, 120, 138, 143, 145, 147, 151, 152, 164, 166, 185, 190, 194, 212, 214, 227, 238, 249
Stark, Harold Raynsford-100
Stettinius, Edward-139, 188, 235
Stimson, Henry-97, 109
Stoessinger, John G.-15
Stokesbury, James-127, 128
Strausz-Hupe, Robert-234
Strik-Strikfeldt, Wilfried-204
Sulzberger, C. L.-149
Suvorov, A. V.---194
Suzuki, Kantaro-155
Szimaitis, A.---264
U
Uebe, Klaus-214 Ushakov, F. F.-194, 195 Ustinov, D. F.-5
Vasilevsky, A.M.-156, 167, 218 Vatutin, N. F.-135, 136 Vogel, Georg-263 Volomann, Hans-Erich-77 Voroshilov, K. Y.-62, 66, 67, 69
W
Wagner, Ray-214 Walendy, Ugo-93 Wallin, H.-113 Wattenberg-315 Weinberg, Gerhard L.-74 Welczeck, Johannes von-43 Welles, Sumner-118, 187 Welter, Gustav-194, 204 Werth, Alexander-251 Weygand, Maxime-86 Weyr, Thomas-133
White, Ralph-205
Williams, William Appleman-99
Wilson, Horace-31, 60
Wint, Guy-90, 92
Winterbotham, F. W.-95
Wright, Quincy-18
R
Rado, Sandor-126
Raeder, W.-256
Rauch, Basil-101
Rauch, Georg von-194
Reagan, Ronald-243, 267
Reichenau, Walther von-199
Reid, Alan-168
Reinhardt, Klaus-10, 108, 177, 197
Remond, Rene-182
Rendulic, Lothar-206
Reynaud, Paul-258
Ribbentrop, Joachim von-.34
Rokossovsky, K. K.-135
Roosevelt, Franklin Delano-15, 97, 99--101, 109, 112, 120, 139, 144, 183, 186, 188, 215, 220, 234, 235, 250, 258, 259
Rose, Lisle A.-182, 192
Rosenberg, Alfred-198,
Rossler, Rudolf-126
Root, Waverly-15, 16
Roussel, Eric-261
Ruge, Friedrich-87
Russett, Bruce M.-234
Ryan, Cornelius-121, 147, 149
N
Nahimov, P.S.-194, 195 Napoleon-248 Nevsky, Alexander-194 Nikolai-250 Noel, Leon-71
Tansill, Charles C.-99
Taylor, Alan-84, 161, 162, 166,
210, 233, 237, 238, 241 Taylor, Telford-30, 71, 73 Thorez, Maurice-229 Toland, John-16, 146, 147, 149 Tolbukhin,F.I.-219 Tolstoy, A.-250 Trotignon, Yves-225 Truman, Harry-150, 152, 153,
190, 191, 227 Turney, Alfred W.-113--16
Yakovlev, A.S.-77 Yamamoto, Isoroku-98 Young, Peter-158
O
O'Ballance, Edgar-197 Oberliinder, Helmdach Erich-207 Orlando, Vittorio Emanuele-31 Ott, Engcn-54 27S
Zeitzler, Kurt-121,123 Zhukov.G. K.-115,117,135,167,
191,213 Ziemke, E.F.-120, 121, 130, 133,
168, 179 Zumwalt, Elmo R.-242
279 __ALPHA_LVL0__ The End. [END]REQUEST TO READERS ~
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