IceBreakChron VI: UNBEARABLE DECISIONS

[JasonPratt]

For the prior thread of my Icebreaker Thesis Chronology project, click here.

For the Table of Contents and Introduction thread, click here.


Transformations
------------------

March 13, 1940, on the same day as Finland sues for peace, the Politburo releases a decree "On Military Retraining and Regrading of Party Committee Cadres and the Conditions for the Mobilization into the WPRA": all "Party Committee cadres shall go through systematic military retraining, so that whenever they may be called into the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army or Fleet they will be able to perform in positions appropriate to their qualifications." The People's Commissar for Defense gets the job of grading these Party bureaucrats and commissioning them with freshly minted military ranks. The Party thus transforms from a para-military to full military government.

What appropriate military roles are high-ranking government bureaucrats qualified for?!

Don't worry, these appointments are not mere political cronyism! The recent Soviet military invasion of Finland demonstrated a need for the new Soviet civic powers, brought along and installed after invasion (as well as prepared beforehand secretly within the target nations), to cooperate better under and with military authority.

Some bureaucrats already have military training, others have none; but the concept is to bring them all more fully into military command and control by giving them related military training and ranks. This is no small effort: from May 1940 through February 1941, 99,000 reserve political cadres including 63,000 leading "Party committee cadres" will be given military training (including drafting into the Army), examinations, and military ranks.

But what need do the Soviet Union leaders expect to have, for such an incredible number of after-invasion political operatives, being trained to cooperate with the military in pacifying invaded areas? 

[JasonPratt]

Spring 1940: the Ribbentrop-Molotov takedown of Poland has added a new potential security corridor, naturally difficult, 125 to nearly 190 miles across, with a poor railway network. "The area favored defenders and facilitated setting up barriers." (Yeremyenko, "When the War Began", p. 71) The Poles had made amazing use of these defenses during the first Soviet invasion in the early 1920s; but had been fatally distracted by Hitler in 1939.

Former 7th Army Commander Meretskov, now Chief of the General Staff, recent veteran of defeating the Finnish Mannheim Slavic-style security corridor -- regarded by military leaders around the world as impossible to defeat by even a modern army! -- now has an opportunity to build up a new security corridor in Poland, to defend against the Nazi foe.

Hundreds of miles of neutral Polish depth have been removed out of the way of Soviet and Nazi borders at Stalin's diplomatic command, so he can't count on that anymore; but on the other hand the Soviet Union has more property and resources to survive on while making preparations for, let's say, the next two years! (A two year plan set up by the Politburo and the Supreme Soviet, ultimately by Stalin, back in mid-August, for starting the final revolutionary world war to take all property under control of their government.) Besides, Russia has been adding epic defensive borders throughout its expansions for centuries (crippling Russia's own economic growth in the process), and the Soviet Union started up again after the last failed invasion of Poland in 1920.

Meretskov has historical, institutional, and personal experience to draw upon for creating a barrier no army in the world could ever hope to bash through, even without neutral Poland helping as a first line of defense. True, Stalin doesn't have ten whole armies of defensive sappers yet (those would come after Barbarossa has fully started, in the second half of 1941), but Meretskov has the resources to expand the Soviet security corridor to depths and densities heretofore undreamed of!

So, Meretskov's orders to secure the western border of Russia:

1.1) Destroy (or rather finish destroying) the defensive security belt already set up along the western borders.

1.2) Disband all demolition teams prepared to defensively destroy Soviet rail transport and infrastructure.

1.3) Pull all dynamite off the Soviet bridges, so that they cannot be detonated in defense against an invasion. (Note: do this before disbanding the demo teams!)

1.4) Deactivate all Soviet defensive mines. "Mines are powerful things," writes Marshal of the Soviet Union G. I. Kulik, "yet tools for the weak and defense-minded. We do not need mines as much as we do mine removal." (Suvorov unsourced quote at the start of "Icebreaker" chapter 9.) Mines are tools for defense, and defense is for the weak, not for the mighty Soviet Red Army and its plans!

1.5) Level Soviet defensive barriers.

2.) Create no such belts in the newly gained Polish territory which is naturally primed for such defensive belts.

3.) Deploy Red Army main-force elements right along the border, without any security corridor to act as their defensive buffer in case the Nazis invade them.

4.) Move all strategic Red Army supplies up to the border, from deep within Russia.

5.1) Launch high-priority development of a huge air-base and transportation network at the former western borders, running primarily east-west (not primarily north-south back and forth behind defensive lines).

5.2) The one-way rail lines on this side of Poland? Upgrade them to two-way lines. Do not add defensive plans to destroy the lines in case of German invasion. In fact, lay new tracks right up to the German frontier.

6.) Inactive bridges in Poland seized by the Soviets are not to be destroyed. Their defensive dynamite is removed (unused by the Poles thanks to having been captured so completely, largely thanks to the Nazi invasion striking from the north, south, and west, forcing emergency re-deployments.) Former 4th Army Chief of Staff Colonel Sandalov, will complain later in his memoir "Overcome", p. 99: "Why did [our] 4th Army's sector have that many [four] bridges across the Bug [river] anyway?" 4th Army will be caught asleep by the German blitzkrieg over the bridges, and destroyed, providing the Germans access to the rear of the super-strong Soviet 10th Army which receives an epic defeat thereby, allowing Guderian to race toward Minsk. Sandalov, the man in charge of those bridges, is not put up against a wall and shot for catastrophic dereliction of duty, or even as a scapegoat for poor orders from higher up. On the contrary, he is promoted eventually to Colonel-General, winning distinction in many operations, thanks to his chief character-trait: meticulous preparations to the last detail, leaving nothing to chance.

The Nazis ceded the bridges to Soviet control after the parceling of Poland, and did not demand their destruction, only that they would not be used -- which until Barbarossa they were not. Hitler had his reason for not demanding the defensive destruction of the bridges: he planned to use them to invade Soviet territory. And he eventually did.

From Starinov's "Mines Awaiting Their Moment", p.175: "In the west, our country already found itself face to face with fascist Germany's powerful military machine [thanks to the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact]... The threat of invasion loomed over England... Familiar with preparations for mounting barriers in areas close to the [former] border, I was simply stunned: even what we had succeeded in putting up from 1926 to 1933 had been virtually leveled. No longer were there any ready-to-use charges being stored near major bridges and other assets. Not only were there no [demolition] brigades, there were not even any special [demolition] battalions... The Ulyanovsk Institute -- our only academy for turning out highly competent commanders to head detachments equipped with radio-controlled mines -- had been converted into a communications training facility."

[JasonPratt]

1940, date of the incident unsourced by Suvorov: Marshal of the Soviet Union Brezhnev, in his 1978 memoir "A Speck of Land", portrays a meeting of Party propagandists in Dnepropetrovsk.

"'Comrade Brezhnev [says the team tasked with promoting Soviet propaganda, being portrayed here by Brezhnev], we are supposed to explain [Soviet] non-aggression, that it is for real, that whoever does not believe it is carrying on provocative conversations. Still, ordinary folks don't believe it much. What should we do: explain [non-aggression policy] or not explain it?'

"In those days [Brezhnev remarks], you were faced with quite a few knotty issues. Around the Hall four hundred people all were waiting for my answer; the luxury of time for reflection I did not have.

"'Explain it, absolutely!' I said. 'We'll keep right on explaining  [Soviet non-aggression policy], until in fascist Germany there won't be even one stone left standing atop another!"

[JasonPratt]

1940: a canal system had been originally built in the 1770s-80s (after proposition in the 1600s) by the last king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, connecting the Bug River to the Pripiyat through tributaries. After decline and disuse, it was partly rebuilt in the 1920s by Poland, to house the Riverine Flotilla of the Polish Navy at Pinsk. Their purpose had been to help support Poland against another Soviet invasion (after the 1920 war), but during the 1939 invasion they had been scuttled and sunk. Suvorov, for whatever reason, is somewhat misleading about Soviet work on the canal and the reconstitution of the Pinsk Naval Flotilla, but there is also misleading information elsewhere which doesn't cover his material.

The Soviets apparently start trying to refloat, repair and rearm the flotilla in 1939 through 1940, as well as rebuilding the (damaged?) port facilities; but some significant number of the new Pinsk Flotilla are coming (per Suvorov) from the lesser half of the previous Dnepr Flotilla disbanded in 1939 upon the Nazi (and then Soviet) invasion of Poland.

Suvorov also implies (in "Icebreaker") that it was the Soviets who dug the canal system from Pripyat River to the Bug; but (as he footnotes in "Chief Culprit") that system had been dug in the 1770s and 80s as the Royal Canal, and the Poles themselves had already partially restored it starting in 1837, with the main work conducted from 1846-48. From 1851 the canal served as the shortest route between Eastern Europe and the Rhine-Atlantic waterway system. In 1919 and 1920 it was completely abandoned once again, during the Soviet invasion(s) of Poland.

Nevertheless, per Suvorov (unsourced), Stalin orders the Red Army (eventually bolstered by the appointment of Zhukov) to work on the Canal with the aid of thousands of gulag prisoners under command of the NKVD. 14 miles of new canal were built near Kobrin to straighten the old canal; Suvorov reports a total of nearly 80 miles were dug under command of Colonel (later Corps of Engineers Marshal) Aleksey Proshlyakov. The Soviet Union at this time owned only a small part of the Bug River, around Brest, beyond which the Bug veers sharply to Warsaw. Suvorov claims that during this time, the Bug carried no commercial traffic, and that even the reconstructed and enlarged canal system was not used for commercial traffic (still too small for heavy tonnage vessels). Conditions are horrible: equipment sinks into the swamps, so the only way to complete the canal by Stalin's deadline is to dig everything by hand. Nobody will know how many gulag prisoners, and soldiers for that matter, died renovating and redigging the canal.

The only mission for the (newly rebuilt) canal was to let ships reach the Vistula Basin and any points west along the Vistula. The Soviet Pinsk Flotilla had all its prows pointed westward, in an area where turning back toward the (narrower and shallower) headwaters would be difficult: the Pripyat being only 160ish feet wide at this new Soviet Naval base, at least five hundred thousand meters from any salt water! Stalin (per Suvorov) has demanded that the canal system be ready by summer 1941, and partly thanks to the eventual oversight of Zhukov they will succeed -- backfilling (not adding) any anti-tank ditches in the area while they go.

[JasonPratt]

post-Winter War: the Soviet Armies of the Finnish border invasion are being redeployed elsewhere (sometimes after nominal disbanding). The 15th Army, one of the new trilogy raised to help defeat the Finnish security corridor, will surface in the Far East. 8th and 9th will move to the borders of the Baltic nations and Romania respectively.


April 14 to April 17, 1940: the Kremlin assembles a council of the supreme command staff to discuss, in Stalin's presence, the Winter War's events. They decide among other things that the 203mm howitzer clearly isn't strong enough to destroy dedicated defensive bunkers created by a nation as rich and powerful as Finland!  What could they do then against a nation more powerful and well-equipped than Finland?!

The Soviets do have a 305mm howitzer, but had not brought many to the Winter War theater for obvious reasons: they could hardly operate 205mm guns in those conditions! Still this gun now becomes the prime bunker buster (per "The Winter War, 1939-1940", Vol.2, p.239). This 1939 model B-18, the latest available, weighs 45.7 tons, and fires a shell weighing 330 kg (not counting the powder bags of course). Muzzle speed is 530 m/s, maximum range 16.6 kilometers.

This naturally begs the question of which nation-more-powerful-than-Finland, whose defensive bunkers the Soviets are planning to hit with this weapon...


May 1940: the pre-GRU sends Richard Sorge another message inviting him to come home and be shot in the head as a procedural caution -- also because he's a defector now for not agreeing to return to be shot in the head as a procedural caution. His reply, "Of course, given the current military situation we are postponing return home. Once again assure you, this is not the time to address that issue." By now he ranks as a malicious defector.

[JasonPratt]

Hey, remember the Great Purge of the Soviet military, when Tukhachevsky and his allies were rounded up and shot, and a bunch of other Soviet officers were also arrested but only a relatively small fraction were shot?

May 5, 1940: today the Deputy People's Commissar of Defense, E.A. Shchyadenko, signs the "Report of the Chief of the Command of the Staff Personnel of the Red Army of the Defense Commissariat of the USSR". Well, that sounds sufficiently important! What's this report about?

The concluding phrase of the report sums it up: "Those unjustly dismissed are returned to the army: 12,461 in total by May 1, 1940." This is more than the 10,860 who had been arrested during the Great Purge (1600ish of whom had been slain in the process, during the arrest or shortly afterward).

Wha---how?!? 

This number includes many who had been arrested but who have survived in prison until now; and many who had been dismissed from service for political reasons but who had not been arrested.

In effect, the Soviet Union has regained all the officers arrested in the Great Purge and more! -- indeed, while not all the arrested officers (still surviving) return at this time, it is known (claims Suvorov) that the main mass of the remaining officers dismissed for political reasons during the Purge, whether they were arrested or not, will also return after this day, especially in the first half of 1941; for example future Army General A.V. Gorbatov.

Shchyadenko who received and presented the original document about dismissed commanders in 1938 will often be quoted by post-Stalin Soviet propaganda, with the implication that Stalin shot forty thousand of his officers, thereby fatally crippling the Red Army before Hitler's invasion. Shchyadenko's report about the return of most of those who had been dismissed and arrested for political reasons (i.e. "unjustly"), is not nearly so often quoted!

Post-Stalin Soviet propaganda will teach that Stalin executed all the intelligent people and left only idiots in command of the army. German Major-General F.W. von Mellentin, who fought for the Nazis against the Red Army, will have a different opinion in his memoir "Tank Battles 1939-1941", 1998, p.244, "The Russian high command knows its job better than the command of any other army."

[JasonPratt]

May 8, 1940: Nazi state radio announces that Great Britain is planning to invade the Netherlands; while mocking reports, as "ridiculous rumors" propagated by "British warmongers", alleging that two German armies are being moved up to the Dutch border.

May 10, 1940, two days after mocking reports of two German armies being moved up to the Dutch border, the Nazis invade Holland and Belgium as part of a two-prong preparation and invasion of France -- who will be unexpectedly conquered within two months!

The point is this: once Hitler starts moving his armies to the border, he has a very limited window before he can launch surprise operations; during which he tries to sow confusion by blaming the people trying to sound the warning about his invasion, for trying to foist a war or even invade the victim themselves.

Hitler now has ten armored divisions by the way. Better than six? Well, sort of: in effect he still has the same number of tanks (although the proportion of better to worse tanks is better now); but that same number of tanks has been divided into ten divisions rather than into six!

[JasonPratt]

May 1940, Boris Shaposhnikov, father of Soviet mobilization theory, is promoted to the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union, and Deputy of the People's Commissar for Defense.


May 1940: the Red Army until now had designated brigade commanders and upward as "Brigade Commander", "Division Commander", "Corps Commander", and "Army Commander", with small red diamond-style insignias: one for brigade command, two for division, and so on.

This month, Stalin introduces generals' ranks, replacing the diamonds with braids and stars. From brigadier rank upward these are Major-General, Lieutenant-General, Colonel-General, and Army General. (For ease of reference, Suvorov usually applies these ranks backward to equivalent force-commander ranks before this date.)

A government commission carries out an across-the-board reclassification of all senior commanders; and they do not simply shift designations. Most BrigComs become Major-Generals, but some go back to Colonel, and BrigCom Muzychenko promotes to Lieutenant-General. Many Army Commanders demote to Colonel-Generals, such as Gorodovikov, Pavlov, Voronov, and Shtern. Army Commander Kachalov gets demoted twice to Lieutenant-General. Corps Commander Zhukov becomes the first General in the Red Army to be awarded five stars, the first Army General; only two other officers will hold this rank for a while along with him. (Suvorov calls this five-star in Chief Culprit and four-star in Icebreaker. There may be an interpretation error; 5-star would be Marshal of the Soviet Union, 4-star should be Army General, the rank above Colonel-General.)

By June 1940, one thousand and fifty-six of the highest rated "Coms" are translated to generals or admirals, with shifts according to their abilities. But for Stalin, one thousand generals aren't enough. There are so many brigades, divisions, corps, and armies being formed, that generals are often commanding above their rank, and colonels are commanding brigades: no fewer than one hundred colonels are assigned to divisional command! Colonel-Generals should command corps, but Colonel-not-General Fedyuninsky shall serve as the 15th Rifle Corps leader in the 5th Army!

But why transition from the by-now-traditional Soviet "Commander" to "General" title at all? Stalin has no problem purging ranks when he wants to; bullets and imprisonment for (supposed) treason, are much more insulting than demotions, so he isn't trying to spare feelings while he makes adjustments in command ability!

The answer is that, once Hitler turns his back on Stalin to invade the Lowlands and France, Stalin suddenly starts creating job opportunities for talented commanders, and currently a large number of talented Soviet rank "Commanders" are sitting in Lubyanka Prison or in gulags. Quickly many are freed! -- most have been freed, or called back from political dismissal, by May 5th (according to the prior entry on that day), and practically all the rest will be freed from prison by May 1941, and put back to work.

If you're wondering why it sounds like there's a distinction between those freed before May 5th, who are given an apology for their "unjust" imprisonment or dismissal, compared to those set free from prison and given commands again after May 5th -- well, good catch, that's exactly right!

Some re-instituted brigade+ commanders are given apologies that a mistake was made in their case; these are shifted to the newly created General category, like Major-General Rokossovsky (one day to be a Marshal of the Soviet Union). Other Commanders released from prison however -- and this is the important distinction -- keep their "Commander" rank: rank, insignia style, uniform style; BrigCom, DivCom, CorCom. (No ArmComs anymore; those are always commanded by Generals now.)

Both classes of arrested high-rankers have been condemned to die in prison, by long or short methods, then suddenly one group are whisked out, to be given cushy first-class rail transport, filled out at Party-elite health spas, handed back reins of power -- and (as Rossokovsky will put it in his memoirs) given "chances to redeem themselves". The other group are given reins of power, but not usually the new General rank: their old outdated pre-imprisonment ranks of Commander stay the same with all the distinctions, and they are given no guarantees they won't go straight back to prison (or to a firing squad). Performance results may guarantee survival and (relative) freedom.

DivCom Vorozheykin, for example, will be released to become airpower commander for Second Strategic Echelon's 21st Army; by July 1941, despite the disasters of Barbarossa, his performance will earn the shift to Air Force Major-General: a brigadier rank, but no longer a gulag rank. By August 1941, he will be promoted to Red Army Forces Chief of Staff; by 1944 he will be Marshal of the Air Force.

BrigCom Gorbatov, as another example, will be released next year on March 5th 1941: "March 5th I consider the day I was reborn", comparing his ordeal to being buried alive in a coffin during Chekist interrogation and dug out again to continue; something he either saw done or experienced firsthand. An interrogator, releasing him, is assigned as his personal aide: "Here's my number, call me if anything happens, no matter the time, count on me to help!" Gorbatov takes with him a bag of mending patches and galoshes, plus pitch-black pieces of sugar and dried biscuits which he had been keeping in case he got sick and couldn't go for food -- no food would be brought to him. Those will serve as memoirs, and as reminders of what had been done to him -- and might still be done to him again. (From his memoir "Years...Wars", pp.168-169) He becomes Deputy Commander of the 25th Rifle Corps, 19th Army, in the Second Strategic Echelon. He shall also be shifted to General, and promoted to commander of all Soviet Army Airborne Assault forces.

"Coms" will be used for reinforcing the First Strategic Echelon, too. BrigCom Zybin gets 37th Rifle Corps; DivCom Magon, 45th Rifle Corps (both 13th Army); BrigCom Tkachov, 109th Rifle Division in the 9th Special Rifle Corps (more about why it was titled "Special" later!) BrigCom Ivanov becomes Chief of Staff for 6th Army. DivCom Sokolov, CorCom for 16th Mechanized Corps, 12th Army; DivCom Burichenkov, commander of Anti-Aircraft Artillery, Southern Sector. DivCom Alekseyev, Commander of 13th Army Aviation. BrigCom Krushin, Chief of Staff Northwestern Front Aviation; BrigCom Titov, Chief of Artillery, 18th Army.

But many of the newly not-generalized "Commanders" won't be assigned to First Echelon service -- but rather to the Second Strategic Echelon. More about this later...

[JasonPratt]

First half of 1940, undated by Suvorov: General Pavlov, Army General for the Western Special Military District, calls a meeting with his army commanders and chiefs of staff. Preparations are underway for command-and-staff maneuvers, in order to fine-tune how commanders, headquarters staff, and communication networks, are to handle their mission early in a war.

What kind of war? The kind of war where the "Western Front", indicating the start of military operations, must be secretly created (because the start of military ops is also secret)' and where Soviet headquarters will be expected to relocate westward.

4th Army Chief of Staff Sandalov will recall later (as a retired Colonel-General, in his memoir "Overcome", p.65), that at this meeting he joked about where 4th Army headquarters is supposed to relocate -- because at this meeting the plans are for 4th Army HQ to be at the border already! It must be stressed that in a defensive war, HQs should be protected as far back from the front line as feasibly possible, so as to direct defenses in a big picture. Even in a normal offensive war, the HQs aren't supposed to be parked practically at the front line. This only makes sense in a surprise blitzkrieg invasion, such as what the Nazis and Soviets have already done (on much smaller scales) since September 1939; and such as what the Nazis will be doing on June 22nd next year.

General Pavlov, the fourth ranking officer in the Red Army (which is why the Western Special Military District is practicing to become the Western Front HQ), called the meeting together; but he has a special guest attending: the third ranking officer, Army General Tulenyev, commander of the Moscow Military District. It makes sense for the MMD to have such an incredibly high ranking general, just on principle, but to say the least the MMD is not near the border! -- what is he doing here, at a meeting to coordinate headquarters for the armies of the eventual Western Front for moving farther westward? Did he have nothing better to do with his time as, effectively, the military governor of Moscow and its surrounding areas?!

At the risk of spoiling the story much: one day next summer, before the Nazis invade, all his divisions will pack up and be assigned to other armies either already at or moving toward the western border; whereas he shall send all his staff to prepare for the creation of his command of a Front Headquarters. So he has some vested interest in seeing how the eventual Western Front, under his peer Pavlov, is organizing subordinate army headquarters (some of which will be receiving Tulenyev's divisions next summer). In fact, he currently expects to be commanding the Western Front! -- it won't be until February 1941 that Zhukov will insist for Tulenyev to be assigned as commander of the (already planned) Southern Front.

Sandalov meanwhile (as he recalls in his "Overcome" memoir), is explaining to 4th Army Commander Lieutenant-General (and future Marshal of the Soviet Union) Chuikov, recently transferred from the Far East, in deference to General Tulenyev to be sure he has the details correct, "Once enough troops from interior districts have moved up, to reach critical mass, at 4.7 miles per division [translated from metric kilometers], you can advance and be sure to prevail." He's checking with Tulenyev, because a number of those "interior divisions" will come from his Moscow Military District, and also because Tulenyev is currently slated to take command of the Western Front.

Notice that the expectation is that once critical mass is reached, the armies will advance to victory -- that's an offensive move. And, per Suvorov, 4.7 miles per division, about 7.5 kilometers, is a goal for Soviet offensive doctrine.

These plans, of course, are being made before or during Hitler's invasion of the Low Countries and France. Nazi presence on the new shared border(s) is at an all-time low.

[JasonPratt]

Middle and late 1940: during the 30s, Germany had created the Siegfried Line up near the border of French Territory -- and on the periphery of Germany's actual (and previously historical) lines of invasion into France. After Hitler defeats France, he will abandon the Siegfried Line. As reported by Mallory and Ottar, "Architecture of Aggression", p.123, the Germans turn the combat structures over to farmers for storing potatoes. Some facilities they lock from the inside, and then wall up the other exits from the outside. Later, when the Nazis fail to repel the Allied invasions of Europe, the Siegfried Line will have to be re-manned; but the Line had not been in the way of huge moving German forces (who had not attacked against the opposite Maginot Line), so it had not been blown to pieces on Hitler's orders. Yet the keys to some of those steel doors have been lost by 1944 -- no one had thought that Germany would need the Line again.


May 25, 1940, the Soviet government issues a directive that 65 civilian ships must be transferred and adapted for military use to the North Sea fleet; 74 to the Baltic fleet; 76 to the Black Sea Fleet; and 101 to the Pacific fleet. The directive also orders all major shipyards, being under the command of the Shipbuilding Narkomat, to start a regime two extended shifts. For all practical purposes, this is equivalent to wartime production.

[JasonPratt]

May 28, 1940, Belgium capitulates to the Nazis.

May 31, 1940, the heat of the German blitzkrieg in Western Europe. Most of the British Expeditionary Force has fled western Europe from Dunkirk with no equipment, leaving behind all tanks, all artillery, all towing equipment, 63,000 automobiles and trucks, more than half a million tons of ammunition and supplies. (The remainder will evacuate from Normandy ports later under similar danger.) Despite the miracle of Dunkirk’s evacuation, British casualties still total more than 68,000. Fewer than one hundred obsolete tanks are left on the British Isles (per Peter Chamberlain and Chris Ellis, “British and American Tanks of World War II”, 1969, p.66.)

The British fleet is blockading the German navy. Hitler has two options remaining: fight Britain's fleet, for which he needs his own powerful fleet able to win against Great Britain; or arrange peace with Great Britain -- for which Hitler also needs a powerful fleet, because an enraged Britain will obviously not negotiate with a weak Germany, but would instead demand (at the least) his immediate withdrawal from all occupied territories.

Hitler's most modern ship, the cruiser Lutsow, is still unfinished, and he lags far behind Britain in the number of above-water ships. However, Hitler is also suffering from a terrible deficit in raw materials, mainly thanks to that British blockade which he needs to defeat!

Part of Hitler's answer is to counter-blockade with his submarine fleet; but this does not get him his own raw material supplies. Part of his answer will be to try to force Britain's population to demand peace from their leaders, by destroying Britain's meager airforce in the upcoming Battle of Britain (which will start in July). But Hitler's sub fleet and air forces need those raw materials to operate, much moreso for replacing lost equipment!

What can Hitler do? Who will save the Third Reich now?!

Good friend Hitler! Have no fear! It is your good Comrade, Uncle Joe! 

He is already selling you such supplies, though he professes neutrality, yes? He will simply sell you more of what you need to keep your war going! Ah, well, your stolen gold, though valuable, friend Hitler, is no longer valuable enough. But your technology and weaponry, your newest planes, cannons, communication devices, firearms and so forth... what is this? You cannot finish your most modern cruiser? Why, this is worth much fuel and rare minerals for your submarines and planes! Have no worries!

So on this day, the unfinished German cruiser Lutsow arrives in Leningrad, escorted by neutral Stalin's forces through the blockade, delivered to the shipyard of shipbuilding plant #189. A true cruiser, unlike the overarmed destroyer leader Tashkhent (which has finished arming up with the Soviet 130mm cannons this month, entering Black Sea Fleet active duty), this one was not designed from the start to Soviet specifications, so Soviet weapons cannot be mounted. It was decided between the Soviet and Nazi governments that the Lutsov would be built completely according to German designs, and armed with German weaponry supplied by the Nazi government. These are being installed at Leningrad's shipbuilding yard #189. The Lutsow will later be given a Russian instead of Prussian name. Stalin will authorize it to be named the Petropavlovsk.

[JasonPratt]

June 9, 1940: the new People's Commissar for Defense, Marshal of the Soviet Union Semyon K. Timoshenko (who replaced Voroshilov last month, and who served with Meretskov in command of the Winter War), signs a directive on the creation of a Southern Front.

General G.K. Zhukov is nominated to command that front, consisting of the 5th, 9th, and 12th armies.

"Fronts" in Soviet doctrine are only created in wartime, so while the Southern Front doesn't exist quite yet, its creation means the Red Army is planning for a war.

Target: southern Romania.

This little war will be freakishly important to the history of Europe and the world -- in ways nobody involved with this war will be expecting. More on it soon...

[JasonPratt]

June 12, 1940, the order for a total military blockade of Estonia is given to the Soviet Baltic Fleet (per documents published from the State Archive of the Russian Navy, archived on February 19, 2005, at the internet "Wayback Machine", en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_Soviet_Socialist_Republic#cite_note-14).

June 14, 1940, the world's attention is focused on the fall of Paris to Nazi Germany. The Soviet naval blockade of Estonia goes into effect. Two Soviet bombers(!) shoot down a Finnish passenger airplane flying from Tallinn to Helsinki carrying three diplomatic pouches from the US legations in Tallinn, Riga, and Helsinki.

June 16, 1940, Stalin declares that the 1939 mutual assistance treaties with (i.e. forced on) the Baltic States have been violated, and gives six hours for new Soviet governments to be formed! -- from a list of persons for cabinet posts that he helpfully provides! Soviet NKVD border troops go raid Baltic State border posts in Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia.

While the world (starting with Moscow's own propaganda!) continues to mock the Red Army's inability to conquer Finland, the governments and military leaders of the Baltic States had carefully watched the Winter War, and from their observations drew a different conclusion:

the Red Army is capable of carrying out impossible orders, with practically no preparation on a spur of the moment, and will not be stopped by any number of casualties.

To avoid bloodshed and open war, they give orders not to respond to the Soviet ultimatum by forceful resistance.

June 17, 1940, the Red Army deploys from its 1939 military bases within the Baltic States, joined by another 90,000 troops rolling in over the borders, to conquer Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia.

Suvorov exaggerates a little when he says they surrendered without firing a shot. In Estonia, only the Independent Signal Battalion stationed at Raua Street in Tallinn resists, with a battle running several hours until sundown: several casualties including one death on the Estonian side, about 10 killed and more wounded on the Soviet side. Military resistance ends with negotiations and the battalion surrenders to be disarmed.

June 18, 1940, Soviet military operations for the occupation of the Baltic States are complete.

June 21, 1940, the civic occupation of the Baltic states is completed. Rigged, extraordinary single-part parliamentary elections will be held on July 14-15, with a threat running in main Communist newspapers (such as the Estonian Rahva Hääl) that it would be extremely unwise to shirk elections: only enemies of the people stay at home on election day!

For more information on the Soviet takeover of the Baltic States in 1940, see (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_occupation_of_the_Baltic_states_%281940%29) and related links.

[JasonPratt]

June 21, 1940, one year and one day from Barbarossa: even going back to the days of the Civil War, including after the official formation of the USSR, no army has been designated higher than 16th; and only during the Civil War had a 16th Army been created. Today the Soviet Union, in peacetime and without directly expecting invasion from abroad (which will catch them by surprise about one year later), exceeds its previous maximum total of Armies: Marshal Timoshenko signs the People's Commissariat of Defense Decree #4, para 3, forming the 16th and the 17th Armies in the Trans-Baikal region.

Two years earlier, the nation had not been able to afford even one such Army (aside from the loose Red Flag group). Stalin hides the existence of the 16th and especially the 17th Army's creation as long as he can.

He has other reasons to hide the 16th than its milestone as the prior high watermark of Soviet army organizations: this army, precursor of the Second Strategic Echelon, is deliberately designed to be manned by gulag convicts.

It will be commanded until August 1941, by General Lukin, a purge victim and gulag veteran, destined to win distinction in fierce fighting near Smolensk; to be seriously wounded and taken captive; to have a leg amputated;and  to be recognized as a hero by the Germans (why? for being persecuted by Stalin, and yet staunchly defending his people). He shall refuse to collaborate, endure four terrible years as a POW, and then Lukin shall be freed -- only to be returned to a penitentiary (though not again a gulag). Lukin's successor to 16th Army command in August will be an eventual Marshal of the Soviet Union, Rokossovsky, also a gulag veteran of the purge.

16th Army is aimed to go westward; 17th Army is intended to stay as garrison in the Trans-Baikal District, which alone of Military Districts has two national areas, the other being in Mongolia. One might expect that the 17th Army is intended to guard against the Japanese retaking the area, or even invading the Soviet Union by the back garage door (so to speak) cutting off the entire Far Eastern Sector! Maybe so, but even in 1940 the 17th Army will be slimmed down to such an extent that for lack of generals the position of deputy army commander will eventually be held by Colonel Poluboyarov. He does a good job though! -- good enough that next summer before Barbarossa, he will be called away to Moscow, just like the T-BMD Commanders, to receive personal orders (not by courier) before being sent to the Northwestern Front HQ.

Wait, like the other commanders (plural)? Yep! Lieutenant-General Remezov commands the MD first this year, 1940, but he will be transferred to command Oryol Military District, which he'll be secretly preparing to transmute into 20th Army and lead it to the German frontier. Then very briefly at the end of this year will come Lieutenant-General Konyev, recently commander of the original Soviet 2nd Army in the Far East Front HQ; but in April 1941, he will be transferred to command of the Northern Caucasus MD, where he'll be secretly preparing to transform it into 19th Army, a mountain-strike formation, and lead it to the Romanian frontier. After him, Lieutenant-General (eventually four-star Army General) Kurochkin will take command, and he'll be the one who finishes transforming T-BMD into 16th Army -- but Remezov starts it, and Konyev will continue it.

16th Army is created by transferring the officers and troops of the Trans-Baikal MD directly into the army 'container' organization. Later this will happen more smoothly with other interior Military Districts; 16th Army is a first conversion test. For example, Major-General Chernyshov used to command the 152nd Division, before being promoted to Chief of Staff, Combat Training for the entire MD. However, as (eventual) Major-General Loboachov relates in his memoir, "Hard Row to Hoe", p.147, "when the Army moved out, Pyotr Nikolayevich declared he would go off to war with his divisions -- and managed to have himself reassigned to the 152nd." Once the T-BMD converts to the 16th Army, the commander (whoever that is) in charge of the 152nd would normally stay in command, now in the 16th Army organization not the MD; but in this case Chernyshov pulls rank and privilege to get assigned back into command of the 152nd.

While typically the interior MD commanders will just shift over to becoming the general of the transformed Army, in this case Kurochkin will eventually send the 16th Army on its way west, doubtless heaving a sigh of relief at having completed his herculean task (with sufficient secrecy). However, on June 13th next year, he will be ordered to report on the double to Moscow to get his next assignment. He'll be on an express train approaching Irkustk when Barbarossa launches next June 22nd. So, with Kurochkin gone, who will be left as the military governor of the region?

No one at all! -- including not 17th Army's deputy commander Poluboyarov who will already be on the way to the Northwestern Front; but not his superior for the 17th Army either. After mid-June 1941, the T-BMD won't get a new commander until sometime in September, 1941.

We'll be covering this again next year as part of the epic day, and week, of June 13th, 1941: a day more Soviet commanders refer to in their memoirs, in more detail, than the start of Barbarossa! Why?! -- we'll see why later.

[JasonPratt]

June 22, 1940, one year to Barbarossa: France falls, concluding the Nazi whirlwind summer campaigns "Case Yellow" and "Case Red" (Fall Gelb und Fall Rott).

Hitler had enough missiles and shells to do this, rather more quickly than even he and (most of) his generals had expected! But he has nothing left if Stalin goes for Germany now. Almost all his armies are in Western Europe, not on his Eastern Front -- which is now an extended border with Stalin's Soviet Union, with no one between as a buffer zone! Hitler has still not shifted Germany over to a wartime production schedule, so he has no strategic reserve even if his armies could magically teleport back over in time to stop Stalin.

Hitler starts securing France and the Lowlands against invasion from Britain (and any allies she might find), which includes sharply stepping up submarine wolfpack raids on Britain's shipping lines (now that Hitler has ports directly out into the Atlantic). It also includes starting preparations for next year's possible Sea Lion campaign, the invasion of Britain (for which the Battle of Britain in the air serves as further preparation -- but mostly a disruption campaign hoping to bully and terrorize Britain into seeking peace for a while). But while he will start the Battle of Britain soon in July, he will still keep Nazi Germany on a peacetime rate of war production!

That sounds insane (and Suvorov often treats Hitler like a fool for not going to a wartime production regimen), but (as Suvorov also acknowledges when this fits his presentation better  ) Hitler has no choice.

Germany started the war tied by thousands of fragile strings to the rest of the world. Conducting the Anschluss of the Ruhr and Austria; softly (and later more forcibly) taking over Czechoslovakia; conquering Poland, then Denmark, then Norway, then Belgium, then Holland, then Luxembourg, then France: none of that has solved Germany's raw material supply problem (except maybe iron ore from Norway, and moreso from alliance with neutral Sweden.) Perhaps conquering Yugoslavia and Greece later? Nope! Allying with Romania as a Nazi state puppet helps a lot with the oil, but not enough with other things. Seizing control of huge properties filled with few raw materials has not brought any war-material advantages to Germany, even though Hitler now also controls their means of production. France and Belgium, like Germany itself, has powerful steel-casting industries, but not much iron ore. Bootsoles to battleships need that steel, the lack is so bad that German leaders as high as Goering are seriously considering the possibility of building locomotives from concrete instead! (from Albert Speer's "Memoirs", 1997 Smolensk edition, 1997, pp.312-13.) Thirty-percent of the Nazi metallurgical industry's demand for iron ore is being supplied by neutral Sweden (with Nazi guns to her head) from the richest ore mines in Europe (per Alisov and Khorev's "Economic and Social Geography of the World", 2001, p.448) -- but that's a long way from the very north of Sweden, and across the same Baltic Sea that the Soviet fleet is glaring at. Bridges damaged during Hitler's invasions must be repaired with wooden logs, not steel beams. Damaged railroads must convert secondary lines to single instead of double lines in order to use the rails for repairing the primary lines.

Hitler is also getting much of his lumber from the inexhaustible forests of Sweden and Finland. This is needed for building and restoring railroad ties (between the rails), and for shoring up coal mines (also needed for forging steel). Despite the extensive forests of central Europe, including in Germany and Austria (such as the legendary Black Forest), before Germany invaded Poland there was already a yearly timber shortage of about 6 million tons. This has not been reduced! Instead of wood pulp, they are using potato foliage. (Hitler talks about this himself in his June 5, 1942 table talk, archived by Piker, p.348.)

It is impossible to fight a modern war without nickel; but Germany has no nickle deposits. Finland has the nickel. Notably, during the Winter War, Stalin succeeded in capturing the nickel mines at Petsamo! This by itself accounts for 70 percent of Germany's annual nickel requirements: Stalin had reduced Hitler's ability to make war, so far as to grind him to a halt, unable to stop the Allies from rescuing Europe! -- but then in the spring of 1940 (a few months previously to this date), Stalin returned the mines to Finland according to his peace treaty.

Or rather, not returned entirely: the nickel is now mined according to joint Soviet-Finnish shareholding companies, with the participation of Soviet engineers and workers; and Stalin insisted that the director of the entire operation be a Soviet citizen. Of course, nickel from Petsamo goes to the Soviet Union; but Stalin is allowing Hitler to import it, too, and in the quantities Hitler needs to keep making war. (per the Soviet "History of the Second World War, 1939-1945", Vol.4, p.329.) The Soviet 104th Rifle Division, of the 42nd Rifle Corps, of the 14th Army, under Major-General Morozov, is standing right outside the nickel mines -- keeping Hitler in the war.