On the eve of the Great Patriotic War. Chapter Nine

Causes and periodization of the war. The origins of the most terrible war in the history of mankind lay in irreconcilable contradictions between world powers. The leadership of Nazi Germany expected not only to return the territories lost under the Treaty of Versailles, but also dreamed of world domination. The ruling circles of Italy and Japan, dissatisfied with the results of participation in the First World War, in their opinion, insufficient, now focused on a new ally - Germany. Germany's allies also became many countries of Central and Eastern Europe - Finland, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and Bulgaria, whose leaders joined, as it seemed to them, the camp of future winners.

Playing a key role in the League of Nations, England and France were unable to stop the aggressors, they largely pandered to their designs. The attempts of Western politicians to direct Germany's aggression to the east turned out to be short-sighted. Hitler took advantage of their desire to put an end to the communist ideology and its bearer - the Soviet Union, in order to provide favorable conditions for Germany to start a war. Just as short-sighted was the policy of the ruling circles of Poland, on the one hand, together with Germany, participating in the partition of Czechoslovakia, and on the other, counting on effective help from England and France in the event of Hitlerite aggression.
The Soviet leadership in the coming war expected to conduct military operations on enemy territory. The victory of the Red Army could push the process of the collapse of the "world of capitalism." Stalin, on the eve of the war, having agreed with Germany, hoped - by building up military power and foreign policy maneuvers - to include in the Soviet Union the territories of the former Russian Empire lost during the civil war.
World War II can be divided into four periods. They differed from each other in whose side the strategic initiative was, the results of military operations, as well as the internal situation in the warring countries.
The initial period (1939-1941): the aggression of Germany and Italy in Europe and North Africa, the establishment of the hegemony of the fascist states in continental Europe, the territorial expansion of the USSR.
The beginning of the Great Patriotic War and the expansion of the Second World War (summer 1941 - autumn 1942): the treacherous attack of Germany on the USSR and Japan on the USA, the formation of the Anti-Hitler coalition. This period was characterized by the greatest successes of the aggressor states. At the same time, the plans of the "blitzkrieg" collapsed, the aggressors faced the need to wage a protracted war.
A radical change in the course of the war (end of 1942-1943): the collapse of the offensive strategy of Germany and its satellites, the strengthening of the Anti-Hitler coalition, the strengthening of the resistance movement in the occupied territories. During this period, the USSR and its allies surpassed the fascist bloc in the production of military equipment, their armed forces carried out successful offensive operations on all fronts.
The end of the Second World War (1944-1945): the liberation of Europe and Southeast Asia from the invaders, their final defeat. This period was characterized by the strengthening of the position of the USSR and the USA on the world stage, their struggle to secure their positions in the post-war world.
Preparing the USSR for war. The military fire blazing in Europe could not bypass the Soviet Union. This was understood by the leadership of the USSR, which took a number of measures to prepare the country for war. However, serious mistakes were made in doing so. A sharp increase in military appropriations (from 25.6% of the budget expenditures in 1939 to 43.4% in 1941) was not effective enough due to miscalculations in their distribution. Thus, despite a significant increase in capital investments directed to the basic sectors of the economy, the growth in the production of such important types of products as steel, cement, oil, coal, electricity, and building materials turned out to be insignificant.
Attempts by the Soviet leadership to increase labor productivity in industry through the use of administrative resources did not bring the expected results. The Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on the transition to an eight-hour working day, a seven-day working week and on the prohibition of the unauthorized departure of workers and employees from enterprises and institutions, adopted in June 1940, hit hard not only on violators of discipline, but also on the least socially protected strata population: single mothers, working youth, etc.
The situation in the industry was complicated by the mass repressions of the late 1930s, during which enterprises lost a significant part of their managerial and engineering personnel. Young specialists who came from the institute's bench could not completely replace the departed cadres. In addition, many leading designers of military equipment died or ended up in camps. Just before the war, some of those imprisoned (A. N. Tupolev, S. P. Korolev, V. P. Glushko, P. O. Sukhoi) got the opportunity to work in closed design bureaus. Thus, the release of new military equipment was difficult, besides, it was too slowly introduced into production. For example, submachine guns by V. A. Degtyarev and G. S. Shpagin, T-34 and KV tanks entered the army with a delay. The situation with aviation was more prosperous: on the eve of the war, the production of Il-4 bombers, Yak-1 and MiG-3 fighters, and other equipment began.
The replacement of the territorial-militia system of the formation of the armed forces by universal military duty made it possible to more than triple the size of the Red Army. However, the repressions, which weakened the command staff, gave rise to serious problems in command and control. The qualifications of the officers who replaced the comrades who were out of action was low. The staffing of new formations with equipment, means of communication and other materials was insufficient.
Soviet-Finnish war. On September 28, 1939, having concluded an agreement on friendship and borders with Germany, the USSR annexed the Western Ukrainian and Western Belarusian lands, as well as the Bialystok region inhabited by Poles, which were part of the Russian Empire before the First World War. The next country after Poland, which fell into the sphere of geopolitical and sovereign interests of Stalin, was Finland. In the autumn of 1939, the Soviet leadership presented this country with a number of ultimatum demands, the main of which were the establishment of a new border on the Karelian Isthmus and the lease of the island of Hanko. The purpose of the Soviet proposals was to ensure the security of Leningrad and to close the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia for the ships of a potential enemy.
In November 1939, after Finland refused to meet Soviet demands, the war broke out. The offensive operation of the Red Army, which had as its goal the advance into the depths of enemy territory, developed unsuccessfully. Captured by a patriotic impulse, the Finnish troops stubbornly defended themselves. Sweden, England, France, the United States provided Finland with ammunition, military equipment and equipment. Volunteers from other countries fought on her side.

The ratio of troops that took part in the hostilities

The most fierce battles took place in the area of ​​the defensive Mannerheim Line, which blocked the Karelian Isthmus. Parts of the Red Army, which did not have experience in breaking through long-term fortifications, suffered heavy losses in manpower and equipment. Only at the end of February 1940 did the Soviet troops, under the leadership of Commander S.K. Timoshenko, penetrate deeply into the enemy's defenses. Despite the fact that France and England promised Finland to send their troops to help, the Finns asked for peace. Under the Moscow Peace Treaty, signed on March 2, 1940, Finland ceded to the Soviet Union the entire Karelian Isthmus with Vyborg and the area north of Lake Ladoga, the USSR received a 30-year lease on a naval base on the Hanko Peninsula. The Karelian ASSR was transformed into the Karelian-Finnish SSR (in 1956 the status of an autonomous republic was returned to it).
The Soviet-Finnish war, nicknamed "winter" by contemporaries, had a negative impact on the foreign policy position of the USSR. The Soviet Union, as an aggressor state, was expelled from the League of Nations. Many people in the West equated Stalin and Hitler. The results of the war prompted the leadership of Finland to act in June 1941 on the side of Germany against the USSR. Another consequence was the increased conviction of the Führer and his generals in the weakness of the Red Army. The German military command stepped up preparations for a "blitzkrieg" against the USSR.
Meanwhile, the ideas of the Germans about the military weakness of the USSR turned out to be illusory. The Soviet leadership took into account the lessons of the difficult Finnish campaign. S. K. Timoshenko became People's Commissar of Defense instead of K. E. Voroshilov. Although the measures to strengthen the combat capability taken by the new leadership of the Red Army were belated, in June 1941 the Red Army was a much more combat-ready force than at the beginning of the "winter war".
Further territorial expansion of the USSR. Secret agreements with Hitler allowed Stalin to carry out further territorial acquisitions without any problems. The entry into the Soviet Union of the three Baltic countries - Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, as well as Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, was the result of both the use of measures of diplomatic and military pressure, and the use of local political forces oriented towards the USSR.
In September 1939, the USSR offered the Baltic countries to conclude agreements on mutual military assistance. Diplomatic pressure on the neighbors was intensified by the deployment of a powerful group of Soviet troops on the border with Estonia, ten times superior to the forces of the Estonian army. The governments of the Baltic States yielded to the pressure and agreed to sign the treaties. In accordance with them, by May 1940, units of the Red Army (67 thousand people) were stationed in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania at military bases provided by their authorities, which exceeded the total number of armies of the Baltic states.
In June 1940, when the troops of the Anglo-French coalition were defeated in the west, the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs of the USSR charged the authorities of the Baltic countries with activities hostile to the Soviet garrisons. Unable to get help from the West, the governments of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were forced to agree to the introduction of additional Red Army forces into their territory. Demonstrations organized by the left forces and openly supported by the Soviet troops led to a change of governments. During the parliamentary elections, held under the control of Soviet representatives, pro-communist forces won. The Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian Soviet republics proclaimed by the new legislative authorities were admitted to the USSR in August 1940.
In June 1940, the USSR demanded from Romania the return of Bessarabia, which was lost in 1918, and the transfer of Northern Bukovina, whose population was mainly Ukrainians. Romania was forced to cede these territories to the Soviet Union. In August 1940, the Moldavian ASSR, together with Bessarabia attached to it, was transformed into a union republic, Northern Bukovina became part of the Ukrainian SSR.
Foreign policy successes made it possible to move the western border of the USSR, thereby securing the industrial centers of the European part of the country. At the same time, soon after the start of the Great Patriotic War, the negative consequences of such a rapid territorial expansion also appeared. Defensive structures
on the old border were dismantled, and there was not enough time to build new ones. As a result of repressions against the population of the annexed territories, the rear of the units covering the new border turned out to be unreliable. The Soviet-German border turned out to be even longer, which in June 1941 became the starting point for the Nazi offensive deep into the USSR.
However, the most serious miscalculation was made by the Soviet leadership in assessing the timing of a future war with Germany. The ease with which Stalin took advantage of the fruits of the division of Eastern Europe into spheres of influence between the USSR and Germany allowed him to expect that the inevitable war with a powerful western neighbor could be delayed at least until 1942. The consequence of these calculations was that Stalin did not want to believe the reports of Soviet intelligence about the impending German attack. At the same time, the USSR, despite delays in payments by the German side, continued to fully fulfill its obligations to supply Germany with strategic raw materials and food.

“Stalin was very depressed. When they left the people's commissariat, he said the following phrase: "Lenin left us a great legacy, and we, his heirs, screwed it all up ..." We were amazed by this statement of Stalin. It turns out that everything is irretrievably lost?
Mikoyan A.I. "It was".

A few hours before the start of hostilities, Directive No. 1 put all units on the western border of the USSR on alert. Among other things, the directive stated that during June 22-23, after provocative actions, an attack by the Germans was expected on the fronts of the LVO, PribOVO, ZAPOVO, KOVO, OdVO and ordered "not to succumb to any provocative actions that could cause major complications." Apparently, the Soviet leaders believed that the war would begin with provocations on June 22-23 and full-scale military operations at the end of June 1941, after the deployment of units and formations of the Red Army in the West was completed. The reality surpassed all their wildest expectations.

Germany began the war treacherously, without declaring war, with all the forces and means at its disposal, already at dawn on June 22, 1941. A significant part of the Soviet divisions covering the state border was still only on the way to their defense lines, and therefore the border was replete with areas practically devoid of troops (Scheme 1). Not all Soviet units on the border managed to accept Directive No. 1, and those that accepted it were simply demoralized by the highest order not to succumb to provocations in the conditions of full-scale military operations by the Wehrmacht using aviation, artillery, tanks and motorized infantry.

With the outbreak of war, the systematic implementation of a set of measures to transfer the country to a military footing began. On June 22, 1941, mobilization was announced in the Soviet Union, which began on June 23 in all military districts, except for the Central Asian, Trans-Baikal and Far Eastern regions, a state of emergency was introduced in a number of regions of the USSR, and "military tribunals were approved in the areas of military operations." On June 23, 1941, the Headquarters of the High Command of the Armed Forces of the USSR was created, a mobilization plan for ammunition was adopted, and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution that determined the tasks of party and Soviet bodies in wartime conditions.

On June 24, 1941, a decision was made to create a tank industry in the Volga region and the Urals, an evacuation council and the Soviet Information Bureau (Sovinformburo) were created. Decrees of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR "On measures to combat enemy paratroopers and saboteurs in the front line" and "On the protection of enterprises and institutions and the creation of fighter battalions" were adopted. In total, during the war years, about 2 thousand destroyer battalions (military volunteer formations) were created; the general management of them was carried out by the Central Headquarters, formed under the NKVD of the USSR.

June 25 - "to centralize the management of propaganda and counter-propaganda among the troops and the population of the enemy," the Soviet Bureau of Military-Political Propaganda is created, and to ensure the strictest order in the front line and organize a merciless fight against enemy sabotage groups, the institution of front-line and army chiefs of protection of the military rear was introduced . In addition, on June 25, 1941, the USSR NOC directive confirmed the need to create an army group of the RGC at the Western Dvina-Dnepr line. On the same day, according to E. Drig, "the headquarters of the Central Asian Military District ... received an order that the 27th mechanized corps was ready by July 4, 1941 to begin redeployment to the west", to be subordinated to the headquarters of the 28th located in Kirov.

On June 22, 1941, in a radio address, British Prime Minister W. Churchill announced his "determination to destroy Hitler and all traces of the Nazi regime", about his readiness to provide "Russia and the Russian people all the help" that he could and offered the USSR "any technical or economic help, which is in our power and which is likely to be useful to them. The British leadership was ready to send a military or economic mission to the USSR at any moment. According to W. Churchill, the Soviet government did not respond in any way to his “radio address to Russia and to the whole world on the day of the German attack, except for the fact that excerpts from it were published in Pravda and other Russian government bodies and that we were asked to accept a Russian military mission. The silence in the higher spheres was painful.” The Soviet government did not object to "that ... two groups of British representatives were sent to Moscow," but made the reservation "that the Soviet government would not want to accept help from England without compensation and that it, in turn, would be ready to help England." Thus, V. Molotov expressed his readiness to reduce all relations between the USSR and England on an equal footing.

“On the morning of June 23, acting on the instructions of the President, S. Wallace announced an official statement in which the German attack on the Soviet Union was qualified as treacherous and emphasized that “that any struggle against Hitlerism, no matter what source these forces come from, will hasten the inevitable fall current German leaders and thereby contribute to our own defense and security." The statement did not say a word about giving support to the Soviet Union. The next day, Roosevelt himself said at a press conference: "Of course, we intend to give Russia all the help we can." However, he avoided answering the question of what form this assistance would take and whether the Lend-Lease law would apply to the Soviet Union. On the same day, Washington announced the lifting of the blocking of Soviet financial transactions, and a day later, the decision not to apply to the USSR the restrictions prescribed by the law on neutrality, which gave it the opportunity to purchase military materials from the United States and transport them on American merchant ships. .

On June 24, the leader of the Free France Movement, Charles de Gaulle, announced the French support for the Russian people and his desire to establish military cooperation with Moscow. In turn, shortly after Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union and the loss of Syria, "the Vichy government handed over military control of Indo-China to Japan, which thereby obtained without a struggle a forward base for attacks on Thailand, Singapore and the Dutch Indies." According to the American historian S.E. Morison "the impression was given that the western and eastern partners of the Axis intended to link up in India."

According to A.A. Koshkin “by June 25, the Japanese General Staff developed and approved a schedule for completing the preparation and conduct of the war, providing for the start of mobilization measures on July 28, 1941, the decision to start the war on August 10, the start of hostilities against the Soviet Union on August 29, and their completion - in mid-October 1941. ... As follows from this graph, the Kantokuen plan was to a certain extent similar to the German Barbarossa plan and also assumed a "blitzkrieg" against the USSR.

On the evening of June 26, 1941, V. Molotov instructed the USSR Ambassador to the USA K.A. Umansky “immediately go to Roosevelt or Hull, and in his absence to Welles and, having reported on the treacherous attack of Germany on the USSR, ask what is the attitude of the American government to this war and to the USSR. The question of "America's assistance with various goods needed by the Soviet Union" was now "instructed not to raise." Wallace stated to K.A. Umansky that "the American government considers the USSR the victim of unprovoked, unjustified aggression" and that the rebuff of this aggression, undertaken by the Soviet people, "corresponds to the historical interests of the United States." Welles stressed that the American government is "ready to give this struggle all possible support within the limits determined by the production possibilities of the United States and its most urgent needs."

Returning to Moscow on June 27, 1941, the British Ambassador Stafford Cripps (he left Moscow on June 10, 1941) introduced to Molotov all those who had arrived and the entire diplomatic staff of his mission. “In the evening, Molotov again received Cripps and said that after he reported to the Soviet government and personally to I.V. Stalin about the ambassador's proposals, the question arose of what would be the scale and amount of assistance that the parties could provide to each other. On June 25, 1941, Germany demanded that Iran enter the war on its side, but Iran refused the next day. Since the Iranian issue was equally topical for both England and the USSR, V.M. Molotov, among other things, declared the desirability of a common political line towards Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan. Cripps replied that both governments should indeed follow a common policy towards all these countries.

On June 28, Minister of Supply Beaverbrook “declared that the British Government was ready to take all possible measures to ease German pressure on the USSR. In particular, as a "personal proposal" Beaverbrook expressed the idea that England could not only further intensify the bombing of West Germany and Northern France, which is already being done to a large extent, but also send part of its fleet to the area of ​​Murmansk and Petsamo for naval operations against the Germans. Beaverbrook also talked about the possibility of major raids on the northern French coast, that is, the temporary capture of such ports as Cherbourg, Le Havre and the like. If the Soviet Government would put before the British Government the question of closer cooperation in the military field, the British Government would willingly discuss what could be done.

Like this. Everything is everyday, routine. It would seem that nothing portends either a crisis or a catastrophe. Moreover, one gets the impression that the “moment of truth”, the apogee of tension and the culmination of events have not yet arrived, they are still ahead. JV Stalin, without losing his composure and composure, works in his Kremlin office. But meanwhile, it is not he who speaks to the citizens of the USSR, but V.M. Molotov, the Headquarters of the Main, and not the High Command, is being created, the State Defense Committee is not being created, the total mobilization of forces and means - “Everything for the front! Everything for victory, no, divisions of the people's militia are not formed, underground struggle against the enemy in the occupied territory of the USSR and partisan detachments are not organized, armies from the internal military districts rush not to help the armies that cannot withstand the onslaught of the enemy on the border, and not to fill the line of fortified areas on the old state border, but on the creation of a line of defense deep in the rear of the warring armies on the line of the Western Dvina-Dnepr.

Among other things, despite the proposal of W. Churchill and F. Roosevelt to support the Soviet Union, I.V. Stalin not only did not hasten to ask them for help in the fight against a common enemy - Nazi Germany, but also linked the acceptance of help by the Soviet Union from England with the acceptance of help from England from the Soviet Union, i.e. tried to build equal relations with England and the USA.

Apparently, I.V. Stalin had to turn to the citizens of the USSR and the leaders of England and the USA only at the very culminating moment - after the defeat of the Lublin grouping of the enemy by the Red Army before the decisive throw of the united and reinforced armies formed after the start of the war, the troops of the Western and Southwestern fronts, as well as the defeat of the cut off from the supply routes of German strike groups in the rear of the Soviet troops by the RGK army group. The Headquarters of the High Command was probably to be created to coordinate the actions of the Red Army troops liberating Europe from German occupation. The Army Group of the RGC gathered in the deep rear of the warring armies to defeat the enemy that had broken through into the territory of the USSR, and since its occupation was supposed to be short-lived, there was no need to deploy a long partisan struggle. The provision of assistance to England brought the Soviet Union to the same rank as England and the United States. Meanwhile, everything abruptly and irrevocably changed with the breakthrough of German troops to Minsk, the encirclement and defeat of the troops of the Western Front.

With the outbreak of hostilities in the Baltics, units of the 41st German Motorized Army Corps of the 4th Panzer Group encountered resistance from the 125th Infantry Division and the 9th Anti-tank Brigade near Siauliai, as well as forced to restrain the counterattack of the units of the 3rd and 12th Soviet mechanized Corps moved towards Riga slowly and uncertainly. At the same time, units of the 56th German motorized army corps of the 4th Panzer Group easily overcame the weak barrier on the border of the 48th Soviet Rifle Division, which was still being advanced to the border. Having bypassed the barrier near Kaunas from the 8th anti-tank brigade and the 3rd mechanized corps, units of the 56th German motorized army corps crossed the Dubyssa river near the city of Aregala and began a swift rush to Daugavpils through the territory free from Soviet units.

To the south, the 3rd German Panzer Group, like the 56th German Motorized Army Corps, easily overcame the weak barrier of the 128th Rifle Division and the rifle battalions of the 23rd, 126th and 188th Soviet Rifle Divisions, which were still being advanced to the border, dispersed near Alytus, the 5th Panzer Division and rushed unhindered to Vilnius, and then further to Minsk. The Baltic national rifle corps showed their extremely low combat capability and the command of the North-Western Front was afraid to use them to launch a counterattack on the enemy. For this reason, the Northwestern Front essentially lost its front reserve and was unable to stop the breakthrough of the 56th Motorized Army Corps of the 4th Tank Group to Daugavpils in the direction of Pskov and further to Leningrad, as well as the entire 3rd Tank Group to Vilnius and further to Minsk. In turn, a counterattack led by I.V. Boldin of the horse-mechanized group of the Western Front in Grodno was sent against the German army covering the 3rd tank group 9 and therefore, even in principle, could not prevent the advance of the 3rd tank group to Vilnius and Minsk. The breakthrough to Minsk from the south of the 2nd Panzer Group led to the encirclement and then the defeat of the troops of the Western Front.

On the Southwestern Front, the enemy also achieved success, although perhaps not so significant. This was due to the later concentration and deployment of units of the 1st German Panzer Group, the continuous cover of the border by units of the Southwestern Front, its superiority in tanks and aircraft over the German Army Group South. In addition, contrary to the plan to cover the border, the 1st anti-tank brigade did not give way to Kyiv to the 3rd motorized army corps of the 1st tank group, as was the case with the 41st Soviet tank division, and blocking it significantly slowed down the advance of the German units to Kyiv. Unfortunately, the command of the Southwestern Front was unable to fully realize its advantage, and the poorly planned and organized uncoordinated counterattack of the mechanized corps of the Southwestern Front in the Lutsk-Dubno-Rivne region could not stop the enemy’s advance deep into Soviet Ukraine.

On the Northern Front, on June 25 and 26, 1941, Soviet aircraft bombed Finland. Without causing significant damage to the infrastructure and the German troops deployed in Finland, Soviet airstrikes gave the Finnish government a pretext for invading the USSR. Which, despite the persuasion of England, which had very good relations with Finland, immediately took advantage, thereby significantly aggravating the position of the Soviet troops in the Baltic states and near Leningrad. At the insistence of the Soviet government, England in December 1941 was forced to declare war on Finland. To this day, the question remains open: what was the air raid on June 25, 1941 - stupidity or aggression?

Meanwhile, taught by the bitter experience of the unsuccessful initial actions of the Red Army in the winter of 1939 against the Finnish troops, the Soviet leadership did not dare to fight anymore with Finland without a threefold superiority in forces. This is clearly shown by the S-Z.20 plan, which provided for the defeat of Finland with the forces of more than sixty divisions, and then on the condition of German neutrality favorable to the USSR (part 1, scheme 5). It is hard to imagine that the Soviet Union could have decided on aggression against Finland with the forces of 21 divisions (i.e., with a ratio of forces with the enemy 1 to 1), especially in the conditions of German aggression, without having, moreover, an elementary plan for conducting military operations.

The catastrophe of the Western Front crossed out the main version of V.D. Sokolovsky and, having exposed the direction to Smolensk and Moscow, turned into a crisis for the entire Red Army and the entire Soviet Union (see Military and political crisis of the Soviet Union in 1941). The extremely unfavorable situation was overcome by the implementation of the fallback plan of V.D. Sokolovsky in case the Germans break through the Western Dvina-Dnepr line. The Western Front was restored by the armies of the RGC (Scheme 2), and at the expense of the 24th and 28th armies of the RGC and the newly formed formations, the Ostashkov-Pochep defensive line was formed (Part 2, Scheme 2). The fierce battle of Smolensk, the defense of Leningrad and Kyiv finally buried the original plan of conducting joint military operations by Germany and Japan, the complete defeat of the Red Army troops and the destruction of the USSR.

The Barbarossa plan was closely linked with the Kantokuen plan and assumed the encirclement and defeat of the main forces of the Red Army to the line of the Western Dvina - Dnieper in the Baltic States, Belarus and Ukraine. The Wehrmacht had eight weeks to defeat the Soviet Union. Then joint actions with Japan began. At the beginning of July, it was planned to announce mobilization in Japan, in the middle - the capture of Smolensk by the Wehrmacht, at the end - the beginning of the concentration of the imperial army. In early August, after the defeat of the remnants of Russian troops east of the Dnieper-Dvina line and reaching the Crimea-Moscow-Leningrad line, the German armed forces were to be reduced from 209 divisions to 175 formations, and the bulk of the infantry formations returned to Germany.

According to the fair remark of A.B. Orishev, an integral part of the Barbarossa plan was "an attack on the Middle East, and then on the" pearl "of the British Empire - India." After the defeat of the USSR, Germany intended to concentrate a powerful grouping for a concentric offensive against Iran. The invasion was planned to be carried out from Libya through Egypt - with the forces of 2 TD, from Bulgaria through Turkey - 5 TD, 4 TD, 2 MD, and 3 GSD, from Transcaucasia through Iran - by the "Caucasus - Iran" group consisting of 2 TD, 1 MD, 2 GSD from the occupation forces in Russia.

Instead of the 34 divisions reduced by Germany, the Imperial Army of Japan, consisting of 20-30 divisions, was to act against the USSR. Japan in early August just had to decide on the start of hostilities. In Russia, in order to occupy its entire western part up to the Urals, inclusive, two armies should have remained, consisting of 65 German divisions (34 infantry divisions, 9 security divisions, 3 GSD, 12 TD, 6 MD, 1 CD), one Italian and Spanish corps, one Finnish, Slovak, Romanian and Hungarian connections. In mid-August, the Wehrmacht was supposed to capture Moscow, and at the end of August, the forces of the occupying armies launched an offensive against the Japanese Imperial Army, which was advancing after the fall of Moscow. The operation was scheduled to end in mid-October 1941.

According to A.A. Koshkin “as a result of the war against the USSR, the Japanese empire was to include not only its Far Eastern territories, but also the entire eastern part of the Soviet Union, including Lake Baikal. This was directly stated in the decree of the Japanese government of December 7, 1940. ... The document "Plan for the Administrative Management of the Regions of Great East Asia" dated December 1941 stated: "The future of the Soviet territories should be determined on the basis of the Japanese-German agreement ... However, the Primorsky region will be annexed to the territory of the empire, and the areas bordering the Manchu empire should be located under her influence. The management of the Siberian railway will be completely subordinated to Japan and Germany. Omsk is planned as the point of delimitation of control zones.

Faced with such deplorable prospects, I.V. Stalin took the failure of the main version of V.D.'s plan extremely hard. Sokolovsky. The catastrophe of the Western Front had a depressing effect on him. On June 27, in accordance with the pre-war plan, the 23rd and 26th mechanized corps were included in the beginning of the transfer of their units from the Siberian military district of the 24th army. However, with the approach of German tanks to Minsk, the situation became more and more aggravated and got out of control of the Soviet military command. And now the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopts "a special resolution on the deployment of the aviation industry and the accelerated construction of new aircraft factories, the 16th army of the reserve of the High Command in the South-Western direction received an order to load army formations and transfer them to the Smolensk region, and Stalin gives the order to remove Pavlov from the command of the troops of the Western Front and send him to Moscow under guard.

However, Voroshilov, according to V. Goncharov, after having a preliminary talk with Shaposhnikov, proposed “not to arrest Commander Pavlov, but only to remove him from the leadership of the front and appoint him the commander of a tank group formed from retreating units in the area of ​​​​Gomel and Rogachev. Probably, this proposal in the current conditions was the most sensible. Meanwhile, on June 28, German tanks burst into Minsk and already early in the morning of June 29, "Stalin demanded the immediate arrest of his former favorite."

On June 29, 1941, “The Council of People's Commissars and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks sent a directive to the party and Soviet organizations of the front-line regions on the mobilization of all forces and means to defeat the fascist invaders. The directive determined the main program of action to organize a rebuff to fascist Germany, to turn the country into a single military camp under the slogan “Everything for the front! Everything for victory”, to mobilize all forces and means to defeat the enemy”. On June 29, 1941, the tone of not only domestic but also foreign policy statements of the Soviet government changed. In particular, on June 29, V.M. Molotov telegraphed the USSR Ambassador to the USA K.A. Umansky about the need to meet with Roosevelt, Hull or Wallace, and raise the question of the possibility of delivering aid to the Soviet Union. In addition, in Moscow itself, V.M. On the same day, Molotov met with US Ambassador L. Steingard and discussed ways to bring American equipment and materials to the USSR.

On June 29, in the evening, Molotov, Malenkov, Mikoyan and Beria gathered at Stalin's Kremlin. According to A. Mikoyan, “detailed data on the situation in Belarus had not yet been received. It was only known that there was no connection with the troops of the Belorussian Front. Stalin called Timoshenko's People's Commissariat for Defense. But he could not say anything worthwhile about the situation in the Western direction. Alarmed by such a course of affairs, Stalin suggested that we all go to the People's Commissariat of Defense and deal with the situation on the spot. Timoshenko, Zhukov, Vatutin were in the People's Commissariat. Stalin kept calm, asking where the command of the Belarusian military district was, what kind of connection was there. Zhukov reported that the connection was lost and could not be restored for the whole day. Then Stalin asked other questions: why did the Germans allow a breakthrough, what measures were taken to establish communications, and so on. Zhukov answered what measures had been taken, said that they had sent people, but no one knows how long it would take to establish communication.

We talked for about half an hour, quite calmly. Then Stalin exploded: what kind of General Staff, what kind of chief of staff, who is so confused, has no connection with the troops, does not represent anyone and does not command anyone. There was complete helplessness at the headquarters. Since there is no connection, the headquarters is powerless to lead. Zhukov, of course, experienced the state of affairs no less than Stalin, and such a shout from Stalin was insulting to him. And this courageous man burst into tears like a woman and ran out into another room. Molotov followed him. We were all in a dejected state.

After 5-10 minutes, Molotov brought Zhukov, outwardly calm, but his eyes were still wet. We agreed that Kulik would get in touch with the Belarusian military district (this was Stalin's suggestion), then other people would be sent. Such a task was then given to Voroshilov. He was accompanied by an energetic, courageous, agile military leader Gay Tumanyan. I made the suggestion for an escort. The main thing then was to reconnect. The affairs of Konev, who commanded the army in Ukraine, continued to develop successfully in the Przemysl region. But the troops of the Belorussian Front then found themselves without a centralized command. Stalin was very depressed. When they left the people's commissariat, he said the following phrase: Lenin left us a great legacy, we are his heirs - all this ... We were amazed by this statement of Stalin. It turns out that we have lost everything irretrievably? It was believed that he said this in a state of passion.

After the incident I.V. Stalin went to his nearest dacha. To the leadership of the country and its armed forces, according to the memoirs of the same A.I. Mikoyan, he returned on the evening of June 30, when members of the Politburo came to him, and on July 1, 1941, to his working Kremlin office. About the tense atmosphere in the People's Commissariat of Defense on June 29, 1941, G.K. Zhukov. In the journal entries of persons accepted by I.V. Stalin in his Kremlin office and residence on Kirova (Myasnitskaya) Street, 33 for June 29 and 30, there are no records. Obviously, since many of those present at this scene were amazed by Stalin's words, believing that he expressed his opinion "in a state of passion", the essence of the events taking place in the country was clear to an extremely narrow circle of people initiated into the secret of V.D.'s plan. Sokolovsky - Stalin, Molotov, Zhukov and Timoshenko.

And the news of the fall of Minsk, and not of the severance of diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union by the French government, but of the failure of the strategic plan to defeat the Wehrmacht troops on the territory of the Soviet Union by the Red Army, liberate Europe from the Nazis and imprison equal treaties between the Soviet Union and Great Britain and the United States of America.

The reasons for the failure of the main version of V.D. Sokolovsky, by and large, lie in one very large mistake of the Soviet General Staff, multiplied by a lot of smaller ones. In all Soviet plans for the strategic deployment of 1940, the Wehrmacht's strike against the Soviet troops in the Bialystok ledge was assumed in the form of concentric strikes from its base to Minsk (part 1, scheme 3 - 4). During the first strategic game held at the General Staff of the Red Army in January 1941, G.K. Zhukov, parrying Pavlov's attack on East Prussia, delivered two short converging blows on his advancing armies (part 1, diagram 8). After this game and the appointment of G.K. Zhukov as chief of the general staff, all Soviet strategic plans of 1941 began to build on the assumption of a Wehrmacht attack on Soviet troops in the Bialystok ledge in the form of concentric strikes from its base on Volkovysk and Baranovichi (part 1, scheme 10, 12; part 2, scheme 1-2).

To prevent a breakthrough of the 3rd Panzer Group on Grodno - Volkovysk and Lida - Baranovichi, the 8th Ptabr, 17th MK and 21st sk (withdrawn from near Vitebsk, Polotsk and Lepel) stood out near Lida and the 47th sk near Baranovichi (withdrawn from near Bobruisk - Gomel), 7th Ptabr and 11th MK near Grodno, 6th Ptabr and 6th MK between Bialystok and Baranovichi. The 44th sk was withdrawn near Minsk from Smolensk, Dorogobuzh and Vyazma. The whole trouble is that in reality the 3rd Panzer Group was advancing from the Suvalka ledge to Minsk through Alytus, Vilnius and Molodechno. Random 128th Rifle Division, 5th Rifle Division, 184th Rifle Division, and 24th Rifle Division encountered in succession on their way to Minsk were completely unable to stop the tank avalanche one by one and became its easy victims. While the forces specially designed to fight tanks, instead of resisting, were surrounded, they were defeated and destroyed (Scheme 3).

If the thesis about the likelihood of the encirclement of Soviet troops near Minsk remained in the Soviet plans, both plans of 1941 would contain a plan for the defense of the Suwalki-Vilnius-Minsk road. And in June 1941, the 3rd Panzer Group would have been met not by four random divisions, but by an anti-tank defense line filled with units of a full-fledged 13th Army: 188th, 126th, 128th, 23rd, 85th SD settled in the UR on the border, 7th and 8th Ptabr, 21st sk (17th, 37th, 50th rifle divisions) and 11 microns (29th, 33rd TD, 204th MD ) near Alytus and Varena, 6th Ptabr, 47th sk (121st, 143rd SD) and 17th MK (27th, 36th TD, 209th md) in Vilnius, 24th, 155th Rifle Division in Vileyno and Molodechno near Minsk. The 5th TD and the 29th Lithuanian National Rifle Corps (179th, 184th Rifle Division) PribOVO, released at the same time, would strengthen the Kaunas direction and prevent the rapid breakthrough of the 56th MK E. Manstein to Daugavpils. That would allow the armies of the RGC to meet and defeat the 1st and 2nd tank groups separated by the Pripyat swamps, and the troops from the Lvov and Bialystok ledges would first cut off the supply routes of the 1st and 2nd tank groups, and then go to the Baltic coast, surround and destroy the entire German grouping in East Prussia.

The "Barbarossa" plan was based on the promise of defeating the main forces of the Red Army west of the border between the Western Dvina and the Dnieper. Soviet plan V.D. Sokolovsky, opposing "Barbarossa" significant forces at the turn of the Western Dvina - the Dnieper leveled one misfortune. However, its developers, having incorrectly determined the direction of one fundamental blow of the enemy and not being able to parry it in the end, got into another trouble. As a result, both the German and the Soviet blitzkrieg were thwarted. The Wehrmacht began military operations from a completely clean slate, and the Red Army - from the implementation of a fallback.

The mistake in choosing the direction of the main attack of the 3rd Panzer Group was of a systemic nature and had an even more destructive effect on the plan of a preventive strike. On August 2, 1965, Marshal of the Soviet Union A.M. Vasilevsky, in his interview “On the Eve of the War,” stated that, in his opinion, the task of defeating the enemy on the border with Germany in the summer of 1941 could only be feasible for the main forces of the Red Army, “under the obligatory condition of bringing them to full combat readiness in a timely manner and with the completed deployment of their along our borders until the beginning of the perfidious attack on us by fascist Germany. The wording "with the completed deployment of them along our borders before the start of the perfidious attack on us by fascist Germany" applies exclusively to the plan of N.F. Vatutin (see part 1, scheme 10 and part 2, scheme 2).

Disagreeing with A.M. Vasilevsky on December 6, 1965 “on the first page of G.K. Zhukov wrote the following: “Explanation of A.M. Vasilevsky is not completely true. I think that the Soviet Union would have been more likely to have been defeated if we had deployed all our forces on the border on the German troops on the eve of the war, had in mind precisely according to our plans at the beginning of the war to destroy them in the state border area. It is good that this did not happen, and if our forces had been defeated in the areas of the state border, then the Nazi troops would have been able to successfully wage war, and Moscow and Leningrad would have been occupied in 1941.

In an absentee dispute between two military leaders who took a direct part in the development of Soviet strategic plans on the eve of the Great Patriotic War, G.K. Zhukov.

Summarize. Stalin met the beginning of the war in cold blood, without losing his ability to work. On the battlefield, the implementation of the first part of V.D.'s plan began. Sokolovsky - a breakthrough deep into the Soviet Union of the 1st and 2nd tank groups. Since the climax had not yet arrived, V.M. Molotov and not I.V. Stalin, the General Headquarters, and not the Supreme Command, was created. The war promised to be fleeting, victory was achieved with little bloodshed, and hostilities were soon to be transferred to enemy territory. Therefore, the total mobilization of all forces and means - “Everything for the front! Everything for victory” at the beginning of hostilities was not.

The State Defense Committee was not created. The divisions of the people's militia were not formed, the underground struggle against the enemy in the occupied territory of the USSR and the partisan detachments were not organized. The armies from the internal military districts hurried not to help the armies that could not withstand the onslaught of the enemy on the border, and not to fill the line of fortified areas on the old state border, but to create a defense line deep in the rear of the warring armies at the Western Dvina-Dnepr line. The Soviet Union, to the extreme surprise of W. Churchill, did not ask for help from England and the USA.

Stalin had to turn to the peoples of the USSR at the beginning of the implementation of the second part of V.D. Sokolovsky - the transfer of hostilities to the territory of the enemy. To coordinate the actions of the Soviet armies liberating Europe from the fascist plague, the Headquarters of the Supreme Command was to be created.

Meanwhile, after the disaster on the Western Front, V.D. Sokolovsky, in his version of transferring the war to enemy territory, was a failure. I.V. Stalin took this event extremely hard. Finished G.K. Zhukov to tears, behaved as if we had irretrievably lost everything, left the country without his leadership for a whole day. Thus, the unknown and short war of little bloodshed on foreign territory instantly turned into the well-known Great Patriotic War with the total mobilization of all forces and means.

The reason for the failure of V.D. Sokolovsky in his first version, which brought the country to the brink of disaster, was a systemic error of the Soviet General Staff under the leadership of G.K. Zhukov when determining the direction of the strike of the 3rd German tank group. The Red Army eventually managed to overcome this crisis. While the consequences of an error in determining the direction of the strike of the 3rd German tank group in the event of the implementation of the preventive war plan, N.F. Vatutin would be truly catastrophic for the fate of both the Red Army and the entire Soviet Union

Scheme 1. Grouping of troops of the Wehrmacht and the Red Army by June 22, 1941. Strategic deployment of the Red Army troops in the West. Compiled by: Drig E. Mechanized corps of the Red Army in battle: The history of the armored forces of the Red Army in 1940-1941. - M., 2005; Egorov D.N. June 1941. The defeat of the Western Front. - M, 2008; Irinarkhov R.S. Western special ... - Minsk, 2002; Irinarkhov R.S. Baltic special ... - Minsk, 2004; Irinarkhov R.S. Kyiv special ... - M .; Minsk, 2006; Irinarkhov R.S. At the Dnieper steep ... - M .; Minsk, 2006; Irinarkhov R.S. RKVMF before a formidable test. - Minsk, 2008; Isaev A.V. From Dubno to Rostov. - M., 2004; Kalashnikov K.A., Feskov V.I., Chmykhalo A.Yu., Golikov V.I. The Red Army in June 1941 (statistical collection). - Novosibirsk, 2003; Kolomiets M., Makarov M. Prelude to "Barbarossa" // Front illustration. - 2001. - No. 4; Semidetko V.A. The origins of future defeats Western Special Military District by June 22, 1941 // www.militera.lib.ru; Semidetko V.A. The origins of the defeat in Belarus. (Western Special Military District by June 22, 1941) // Military History Journal. - 1989. - No. 4; Statuk I. Defense of the Baltic States. 1941: Strategic defensive operation in the Baltics (June 22-July 9, 1941). - M., 2005; Statyuk I. Defense of Belarus. 1941: Strategic defensive operation in Belarus (June 22-July 9, 1941). - M., 2005; Statuk I. Defense of Western Ukraine. 1941: Strategic defensive operation in Western Ukraine (June 22-July 6, 1941). - M., 2006; Statuk I. Defense of the Arctic. 1941: Strategic defensive operation in the Arctic and Karelia (June 29-October 11, 1941). - M., 2006; Statyuk I. Defense of Leningrad. 1941: Leningrad strategic defensive operation July 10-September 30, 1941 - M., 2006; Statyuk I. Defense of Kyiv. 1941: Kyiv strategic defensive operation July 7-September 26, 1941 - M., 2006; Statyuk I. Battle of Smolensk. 1941: July 10-September 10, 1941 - M., 2006.

Scheme 2. Fighting in the Western direction from June 22 to July 9, 1941

Scheme 3. Expected by the Soviet command and the real direction of the strike of the 3rd Panzer Group. Compiled according to scheme 1.

In December 1921, in one of his speeches, describing the international situation that had developed in those years, V.I. Lenin said that all our people should be on the alert and remember that our country is surrounded by people, classes and governments that openly express hatred towards us.

Fueled by this hatred, in the early 1920s, the Hitlerite Party was formed, the official name of which was the National Socialist German Workers' Party. The main plans of this party, as A. Hitler later admitted (in February 1945), was the destruction of Bolshevism.

From the very birth of the Hitlerite Party, an attack on the Soviet Union was planned as the first socialist state in the world. In his book “My Struggle” (1924-1926), Adolf Hitler wrote: “When we talk about new territories in Europe, we can think first of all about Russia and the states adjacent to it ... Fate itself gave us the strength to this... The gigantic state in the East is ripe for collapse.”

The actions of the Hitlerite party pleased the international ruling circles of the USA, Britain and France, who would have been happy if Hitler had succeeded in destroying Bolshevism. And at the end of the 1930s, they directly expressed their wishes “that there, in the East, things would come to a military clash between Russia and Germany.”

The general international situation, in those years, was not in favor of the Soviet Union. Many actions of the Western powers were directed against the policy of our state. These "democratic" states not only approved of Hitler's policies, but also contributed materially and politically to the strengthening of Germany's military potential. They put a lot of effort into helping Germany deal with Bolshevik Russia.

In the prewar years, the Soviet Union repeatedly proposed the creation of a system of collective security in Europe, but foreign states stubbornly ignored these attempts, which were aimed at creating a peace-loving policy between countries.

The political goals of the war against the USSR were at the heart of the Barbarossa plan. They implied the destruction of the state centered in Moscow and the creation of a “new order” throughout the world. the defeat of the USSR was supposed to weaken the strength of the international communist, workers' and national liberation movements.

In the autumn of 1940, a German-Japanese-Italian military pact was concluded, thanks to which the Italian fascists and Japanese militarists became direct military allies of the Nazis. It was at this time that Germany launched direct preparations for an attack on the Soviet Union. The parties agreed to recognize the leading role of Germany and Italy in creating a "new order" in Europe, and Japan - "in the East Asian space." It is known that under the concept of “new order” there was a regime of bloody terror, fascist dictatorship and colonial slavery.

In 1939, trilateral negotiations began between the USSR, Britain and France, at which the Union advocated an agreement on mutual assistance to each other in the event of the outbreak of hostilities by Germany. At these negotiations, the policy of France and England, which were playing a double game, was clearly visible. They were in no hurry to give any commitment to help, and even made it clear to Germany in which direction it would be better to start the war. For example, England and France refused to help if the USSR would help resist the aggressor in the area of ​​the Baltic states. This made it clear to Hitler where to hit if he wants to avoid a collision with England and France. During the period of 1939, a number of meetings were held between representatives of three states (USSR, France, England), during which representatives of the military missions of England and France arrived for negotiations without proper authority to sign agreements, these negotiations were also led by minor persons, in contrast to representatives of the Soviet Union. All these actions of the governments of the Western powers made the peace-loving policy of our country difficult in the years preceding the war with Germany. In addition, it later became clear that, simultaneously with the talks in Moscow, England was conducting secret negotiations with Germany, to which she attached more importance than negotiations with the USSR. In these secret negotiations, England pursued its goal - to direct Germany against the Soviet Union and extract all the benefits from this.

England and France broke off negotiations with the USSR. At the same time, the Union should accept Germany's offer to sign a non-aggression pact with it. It was a well thought out move on the part of German politicians. They put the USSR in a position in which it had to carefully weigh its moves in relation to the Soviet-German borders. As soon as the USSR brought the border outposts to full combat readiness, Germany could “consider” this as a violation of the treaty, and thereby justify its barbaric attack as an alleged “forced defense”. But they miscalculated a little, and after a treacherous attack they lost all favor on the part of many peoples of the world. This agreement was concluded on August 23, 1939, for a period of 10 years (Supplement No. 1). It provided for the obligations of the parties "to refrain from any violence, from any aggressive action and any attack against each other, both separately and jointly with other powers." There were 2 years left before the start of the war.

Of course, in the situation of 1941, the USSR had no illusions about this treaty, but it could delay the conflict for some time, and give time for a better preparation of our country. But as you know, the attack was unexpected. It seems to me that our leadership, headed by I. Stalin, is primarily to blame for this, who until the last minute did not believe that Germany would dare to violate the treaty and attack the Union. This is the result of the personal ambitions of our leader. All our people (meaning those who were informed) anxiously assessed the military training of the German troops and their pulling up to our borders. Constant provocations on the border from Germany, haunted our border outposts. And the military leaders of the border troops could only be surprised that there was no order for full combat readiness at the border. Constant protests against the German government, they simply ignored, or wore the form of "unconfirmed information." Of course, the non-aggression agreement between Germany and the USSR brought us tangible help. That is why the United States and England became allies of the USSR in the war against Nazi Germany.

Amazing things were done by our leadership in relation to the Trade and Credit Agreement between the USSR and Germany, concluded in 1939. The description and conclusions regarding this agreement are given in Addendum No. 2.

September 1, 1939 - Nazi Germany attacked Poland, which was the beginning of World War II. It turned out that England and France, which guaranteed the independence of Poland, betrayed it and did not provide any effective assistance in repelling the aggressor. Hitler said that Poland "will be depopulated and populated by Germans", and its territory will become a strategic springboard for an attack on the USSR.

September 3 England and France declared war on Germany, because. she refused to stop hostilities in Poland. This they limited themselves to "assisting Poland" in the conduct of the war with Germany. The Poles were poorly prepared for the war and practically did not last even a month. The Polish government fled to Romania, and on October 5, 1939, hostilities on Polish territory ceased completely. Thus, England and France pushed Germany to the borders of the USSR and encouraged an attack on the Union, pursuing their own benefits.

After the beginning of the invasion of the territory of Poland by German troops in September 1939, the Soviet Union began to actively prevent the spread of German aggression to the east. A liberation campaign was launched in Western Belarus and Western Ukraine. The liberated population annexed their territories to the BSSR and the Ukrainian SSR and thus became part of the USSR.

In 1940, the USSR took a number of measures to strengthen its positions in the Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania). After the accomplishment of socialist revolutions in these countries, power passed into the hands of the working people. All three republics became Soviet and, at the request of their masses, became part of the USSR.

During 1940, the USSR adopted a number of measures that made it possible to move the defensive lines of the Union along the entire length of its western border, by 200-300 km. further from Moscow, Leningrad, Kyiv and Minsk, which was of great importance during the rebuff to the Nazis after June 22, 1941.

On June 14, 1941, another attempt was made by the Soviet government to direct international relations along a peaceful path. A TASS message appeared, which indicated that the rumors about the intention of fascist Germany to attack the USSR "are devoid of any ground." But in Berlin they did not react in any way to the document, which was not even published in the German press. Of course, this should have alerted our government to the intentions of the fascist leaders of Germany. It was clear that the beginning of the war was approaching.

4. All this on the eve of severe trials.

On June 22, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the government introduced martial law in the territories of the Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova and a number of regions of the RSFSR. In areas declared under martial law, all power was transferred to the military authorities. On June 23, the mobilization of those liable for military service 1905-1918 was announced. birth. Queues lined up at the military registration and enlistment offices, leaving for the front. By July 1, 5.8 million people had joined the ranks of the Red Army.

On June 24, the Evacuation Council was created, and on June 27, a resolution of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars was adopted on the evacuation of the population, industry facilities and material assets from the front line. First of all, the equipment of military factories, enterprises of the aviation, tractor, chemical industries, ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy was exported to the east.

In the 1930s there was a significant aggravation of international relations. In 1933, came to power in Germany National Socialist (Fascist) Party headed by A. Hitler. The foreign policy program of the Nazis was aimed at revising the results of the First World War, taking into account the interests of the German people. At the same time, A. Hitler and his entourage declared the need for Germany to establish world domination with the help of a new all-encompassing war of extermination. Although the USSR was interested in a clash between the capitalist countries, unleashing a new war in Europe was not beneficial for it, since at that time it was not ready for it. Therefore, the main foreign policy efforts of the Soviet state were aimed at preventing the growth of the fascist threat. To this end, in the mid-1930s. The Soviet Union supported the initiative of France to create in Europe collective security systems, which had as its goal the counteraction to the aggression of fascist Germany by the joint efforts of a number of European countries. In 1935, the USSR signed mutual assistance treaties with France and Czechoslovakia, which provided for the provision of direct military assistance by their participants to each other in the event of an attack on them by other European states. However, due to the opposition of Poland, which refused to allow Soviet troops to pass through its territory in the event of the outbreak of hostilities in Europe, the implementation of these agreements was disrupted.

Serious danger also threatened the USSR on its eastern borders, where in 1937 Japan began an open war against China. In order to prevent Japanese aggression from approaching its borders, the Soviet leadership restored relations with China and concluded a non-aggression pact with it. At the same time, the Soviet Union began to provide assistance to China with military equipment, ammunition, equipment, and also sent volunteers and military advisers to this country. Meanwhile, the Japanese army occupied the entire northeast of China and went directly to the borders of the USSR. In 1938, the Japanese tried to thwart Soviet aid to China, as well as seize the Far Eastern territories of the USSR. In the summer of 1938, Japanese troops invaded Soviet territory near the lake Hassan, and in the spring of next year, hostilities began in the region of the river Halkin Gol, trying to capture the territory of the USSR-friendly Mongolian People's Republic. During a fierce battle, the Soviet-Mongolian troops under the command of the commander G. K. Zhukova managed to break and throw the enemy back. In the spring of 1941, a non-aggression pact was signed between the USSR and Japan. The threat to the Soviet Union in the Far East was temporarily eliminated.

Meanwhile, taking advantage of the passivity of the leading European powers - Great Britain and France, Germany began to implement its aggressive plans to expand the "living space" in Europe and in February 1938 occupied Austria. Not wanting to get involved in a conflict with Germany, the governments of Great Britain and France in September 1938 concluded in Munich an agreement with Hitler in which the Western powers agreed to the German occupation of the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia, inhabited by ethnic Germans. However, these concessions by the Western powers did not stop Germany's aggressive intentions. The following year, she tore up the Munich Agreement and occupied the whole of Czechoslovakia. Following that, Germany presented territorial claims to Poland. This forced the countries of Eastern Europe, frightened by the fate of Czechoslovakia - Hungary and Romania - to join an alliance with Germany. Thus, the Munich Agreement actually opened the way to the beginning Second World War.

In the face of a growing military threat, the Soviet Union offered Great Britain and France to start negotiations on rendering assistance to each other in the event of a German attack. However, having begun them, the ruling circles of these countries still hoped to provoke Hitler's aggression against the USSR. As a result, negotiations stalled. In the summer of 1939, the Soviet Union proposed that France and Great Britain conclude a military convention providing for joint action by the armed forces of the three states in the event of German aggression against them. The governments of Great Britain and France did not take this step.

Having failed to create an anti-fascist bloc, the Soviet leadership decided to move closer to Germany, accepting her proposal to conclude a non-aggression pact. The contract was concluded August 23, 1939 People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs V.M. Molotov and German Foreign Minister I. Ribbentrop and was named Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, also known as nonaggression pact. The contract was for 10 years. The signatories of the treaty, the USSR and Germany, pledged not to attack each other and not to participate in alliances hostile to each other. The Soviet-German non-aggression pact was beneficial to both sides: it guaranteed Germany the benevolent neutrality of the USSR in the upcoming war with Poland. In turn, the non-aggression pact allowed the Soviet Union to delay the start of entry into the world war, gain time to prepare for it and complete the reorganization of its armed forces. In addition, its conclusion by the USSR frustrated the calculations of Western governments for the development of German aggression in an eastern direction.

In addition to the non-aggression pact between the USSR and Germany, secret protocol, in accordance with which both sides agreed to delimit their spheres of influence in Eastern Europe. Western Ukraine and Western Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Bessarabia (Moldova), which was part of Romania, were recognized as spheres of interests of the USSR. Lithuania is a sphere of German interests.

September 1, 1939 Germany attacked Poland. Great Britain and France, connected with Poland by allied obligations, declared war on Germany. The Second World War began. Convinced of the defeat of Poland and the further inability of the Polish army to offer organized resistance, on September 17, 1939, the USSR sent its troops into Western Ukraine and Western Belarus belonging to Poland, torn away from Soviet Russia in 1920, and announced their entry into the Union. Poland ceased to exist as an independent state. On September 28, 1939, the USSR and Germany signed between themselves treaty of friendship and border, which clarified the line of demarcation of the spheres of influence of the two states in occupied Poland. In addition, Lithuania was recognized as a sphere of interests of the USSR.

After the defeat of Poland, Germany concentrated its main efforts on defeating France and Great Britain. Taking advantage of this, the USSR began to strengthen its position in its sphere of influence. In September-October 1939, the Soviet Union concluded mutual assistance treaties with the Baltic states, which provided for the deployment of Soviet military bases on their territory. In 1940, under pressure from the USSR, the governments of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia were forced to resign, the pro-Soviet governments formed instead of them proclaimed their republics socialist and turned to the Soviet leadership with a request to include them in the USSR. In August 1940 Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia became constituent parts of the Soviet Union. In the summer of the same year, the USSR, under the threat of war, obtained from Romania the transfer to it of Bessarabia, occupied in 1918, and Western Bukovina, inhabited by ethnic Ukrainians.

At the same time, having enlisted the support of Germany, the USSR began to put pressure on the government of Finland, demanding the provision of several military bases in the Gulf of Finland and territorial concessions. The Finnish government rejected these demands. In response, having provoked several border incidents, the USSR in December 1939 launched military operations against Finland.

The outbreak of war was seen by the Soviet leadership as quite easy. Stalin planned to defeat Finland in a short time, after which he would bring a pro-Soviet government to power in it and annex it to the Soviet Union. However, these calculations did not materialize. The Finnish people, as one, stood up to defend their homeland, putting up fierce resistance to the Soviet troops. Despite the numerical superiority, the Red Army suffered several defeats. The actions of the USSR against Finland caused the condemnation of the world community. Great Britain and France began to provide military assistance to the Finns with equipment and ammunition. Finland was also supported by Germany, which did not want the Soviet Union to become too strong. In December 1939, the League of Nations condemned the USSR as an aggressor and excluded it from its membership. The Soviet Union actually found itself in international isolation.

In March 1940, Finland finally admitted its defeat in the war and concluded a peace treaty with the USSR. Part of the Finnish territory north of Leningrad was annexed to the Soviet Union, but Finland itself remained independent. The war with Finland cost the Red Army great losses (according to various estimates, from 130 to 200 thousand people). In addition, the war revealed a high degree of unpreparedness of the USSR for it, which subsequently significantly influenced Germany's plans to invade the Soviet Union.

As a result of the foreign policy activity of the USSR, by the autumn of 1940, a huge territory with a population of 14 million people was included in its composition, and the western border was pushed westward by 200-600 km.

Soviet-German relations in the pre-war period are controversial in the historical literature. The signing of the USSR with Germany of a secret protocol on the delimitation of spheres of influence is considered by some historians as a manifestation of the aggressiveness of the Soviet Union, the desire of its leadership for expansion. Therefore, according to these historians, the USSR bears equal responsibility with Germany for unleashing the Second World War. However, we must not forget that the territories of Western Ukraine, Western Belarus and Bessarabia occupied in 1939 by Soviet troops were the original lands of the Russian Empire and were torn away by Poland and Romania from the Soviet state during the civil war. Forced to cede these lands in the conditions of a temporary weakening of the country after October 1917, the Soviet leadership had every right to seek their return. In addition, it must be taken into account that in the event of a war between the USSR and Germany, the inevitability of which, despite the conclusion of the non-aggression pact, was well understood in the Soviet leadership, there was a risk of the capture of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus by Nazi troops. By incorporating these territories into its composition, the USSR significantly strengthened its security. At the same time, the aggressive actions of the Soviet Union against Finland in 1939-1940, the seizure of Western Bukovina from Romania, which never belonged to Russia, cannot be justified. These actions were a major political mistake of the Soviet leadership. Their consequence was the aggravation of relations between the USSR and Romania and Finland, which entered into an alliance with Germany and later took part with it in the invasion of the Soviet Union.

In 1940 - early 1941. Soviet-German relations gradually began to deteriorate more and more. In May 1940, Germany defeated France and during 1940-1941. occupied most of the states of Europe. In the West, organized resistance to the German army was provided only by Great Britain, however, A. Hitler did not have a strong navy to defeat it. From that time on, the USSR became the main enemy of Germany in Europe. Under the prevailing conditions, the Soviet-German non-aggression pact was increasingly losing its significance. In 1940, the fascist leadership developed plan "Barbarossa" which provided for an attack by German troops on the Soviet Union. The main stake in it was on the implementation of a "lightning war" (the so-called blitzkrieg). It was planned to defeat the Soviet Armed Forces in a short-term summer campaign and end the war by the autumn of 1941. In addition to the Barbarossa plan, a plan was also developed "Ost" ("East"), which provided for the post-war reconstruction of the defeated USSR. In accordance with this plan, it was supposed to exterminate 30 million Russians and 5-6 million Jews. 50 million people from the occupied western regions of the USSR were planned to be resettled in Siberia. It was supposed to resettle 10 million Germans on the occupied lands and with their help "Germanize" the Russians left in the western regions. The largest Soviet cities of Moscow, Leningrad, Kyiv were subject to complete destruction.

The Soviet government was also preparing for war. In 1939, universal military service was introduced in the Soviet Union. In the summer of 1940, a law was adopted, according to which, instead of a 7-hour working day, an 8-hour one was established, and a day off was canceled. Part of the industry was transferred from the production of peaceful products to the military. In 1940 - 1941. the number of the country's armed forces was increased to 5 million people, more than half of the army's personnel and military equipment are concentrated on the western border. Before the war, the formation of large mechanized corps began, the army was re-equipped with modern weapons. The Soviet government planned to complete preparations for defense by the beginning of 1942. However, in general, the USSR was not ready for war.

By 1941, Hitler had captured most of Europe and was ready to launch an invasion of the USSR. The Soviet leadership was aware of these plans and was also preparing to fight back. However, the measures taken were not enough: they were inconsistent and did not cover all spheres of state and public life.

The economy of the USSR on the eve of the Great Patriotic War

Already in 1925, the industrial production of the Soviet Union approached the pre-war level. A significant lag behind Western countries required the modernization of the entire economy.
The transformations boiled down to the following main elements:

• industrialization (creation of a powerful heavy industry);
• approval of the five-year plan;
• active promotion of labor enthusiasm;
• collectivization.

Rice. 1. A. Stakhanov among the miners of Donbass. Photograph 1935.

For the 3rd five-year plan (1938-1942), the task was set to catch up with the developed capitalist countries in terms of production volumes.

The overstrain of material and human resources had Negative consequences :

• the ruin of agriculture;
• lagging light industry;
• fictitious overestimation of indicators for the sake of fulfilling the plan.

In February 1941, the economy of the USSR as a whole was transferred to military needs.

Socio-political life in the country

Industrialization and collectivization were carried out with the help of harsh measures. To suppress possible discontent, the indoctrination of the population was intensified and the regime was tightened.

Since the end of the 20s. demonstrative political trials are being held in the USSR. After the assassination of S. M. Kirov (1934), the policy of “great terror” begins. Its main goal was to get rid of the old revolutionaries who could somehow resist Stalin.

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Rice. 2. Portrait of I. V. Stalin, art. Gerasimov A. M., 1945.

As a result of the terror of 1937-1939. country has lost

• qualified personnel of all levels of management;
• most of the army's high command.

The new leaders and commanders had little experience and knowledge. In addition, they were demoralized and afraid of any manifestation of the initiative.

Foreign policy of the USSR

The main foreign policy actions of the USSR are presented in the table:

Rice. 3. Captured Japanese guns. Khalkhin-Gol, 1939.

The USSR repeatedly turned to Western leaders with proposals for joint action against Hitler, but they preferred to apply a policy of "appeasement."

Results

Briefly about the USSR on the eve of the Great Patriotic War, the following data speak:

• 2nd place in the world in terms of economic potential;
• by 1939, more than 90% of peasant farms were united in collective farms;
• by June 22, 1941, in the border districts, the army numbered a little less than 3 million people.

What have we learned?

By the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the Soviet Union had become a developed industrial power. At the same time, a rigid totalitarian regime has developed in the country. In the field of foreign policy, all the efforts of the Soviet leadership were aimed at containing fascist aggression and strengthening their own borders.

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