Continuation of the series of articles on the Second World War / WWII, previous materials: 1) “They filled up the Germans with corpses,” they say? They lie, with … dogs! 2) Allies, damn it … With such "friends" and enemies are not needed! 3) Black myths of war. Barrage detachments. 4) Black myths of war. Penalties. 5) Poles are still warriors … 6) Vikings of the Third Reich. 7) Payback for sex with the Nazis.
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On August 24, 1939, a non-aggression pact was signed between the USSR and Germany, to which the Poles and Balts actively appeal, considering it a collusion between the USSR and Nazi Germany. It was on the basis of such an assessment (primarily, but not only) that it became possible for them to equate the Soviet and Nazi regimes.
The contract is ambiguous. However, if you remember everything from the very beginning, then the Munich Agreement, which in fact created the technical possibilities for the Second World War, was much more pro-Nazi. But still….
1939 on the border - almost allies?
What was Stalin's idea?
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If someone does not know: Hitlerite Germany treacherously attacked the peaceful USSR. Her insidious treachery consisted precisely in the violation of the essentially allied (meaning the secret part) of the treaty.
In that political situation oversaturated with intrigues and threats, in fact, no one trusted anyone and everyone tried to play their own game, hoping to end up with a common buy. Stalin was an experienced party intriguer, he also had his own plans and in many ways bluffed. With this agreement, he (as historians now interpret his actions) wanted to achieve several goals (defensive option / offensive option):
1) realizing the inevitability of a clash with Germany, push the borders of the USSR to the West as far as possible (create problems for the advancing Wehrmacht / move forward as much as possible without fighting);
So, according to the plan of our strategists, the path of the Red Army to Europe in 1941 was supposed to look like.
2) gain time for equipping new lines and completing the rearmament of the army (to hold back the onslaught of the Nazis / supply and repair base, training units, before throwing themselves into Europe);
3) receive Hitler's assurances of neutrality during the annexation of the USSR, the territories of the Baltic states, Bessarabia, Bukovina and part of Finland (deprive Hitler of convenient footholds, oil and naval bases / taking advantage of the situation, seize the previously lost territories and resources for the subsequent war in Europe);
Broken German armored vehicles - pleasing to the eye.
One of the versions of the events of that time is the "liberation campaign" of communism being prepared in the USSR to Europe. I am not a supporter, not an opponent of this version, but it cannot be ignored - it explains too well the pre-war preparations and Stalin's actions on the border. The version itself is very interesting, but even a superficial presentation will require several separate articles.
From my point of view (which I am not imposing), the 1939 non-attack treaty was more conducive to the offensive doctrine of Stalin. Comrade Zhukov spoke about the same in December 1940, at a meeting of the top military leadership.
Broken Soviet armored vehicles, 1941.
What happened in the end?
1) Poland, which has always been the historical antagonist of Russia / USSR, after its partition in 1939, began to simply blaze with fierce hatred for the Russians, which we see to this day. In the former Polish territory, the Red Army suffered the greatest losses, which opened the way for the Nazis to Moscow (one of the reasons). From 1945 to 1947, the Home Army, fought against the USSR.
2) The same can be said about the Baltics. Repressions, arrests and executions have not made anyone friends yet. German troops were greeted everywhere with flowers and "bread and salt", and they did not cry at the departing Soviet units, but shot in the back. Of the three republics, only in Lithuania, the forested area allowed waging a partisan war, they fought it, but not with the Nazis, but with the Soviet regime until the mid-50s (and some, it seems, are ready to continue now).
Column of captured Red Army soldiers, 1941.
3) With the acquisition of the western regions of Ukraine and Belarus, Moscow received vast territories, with a network of underdeveloped roads, many rivers and swamps, forests favorable for defense, but this contradicted the Soviet doctrine - "war on foreign territory." The construction of roads, bridges, airfields began (and a little later new owners of this entire infrastructure came). However, not a single object was mined, because, on the contrary, they were almost allies. A similar situation developed near Brest, when German units went over the bridges, as in a parade, from three o'clock in the morning on June 22, which ensured a lightning-fast encirclement and defeat of troops on the Bialystok ledge.
4) After the end of the war with the USSR, Finland, with the help of Germany, re-armed, restored its defenses. He pushed the border of the USSR, received Vyborg and a naval base on the Hanko Peninsula, and from a neutral neighbor - an enemy. In the summer of 1941, she returned the seized territories and closed the blockade around Leningrad, but did not move further, which made it possible in 1944 to conclude a peace treaty without occupation by Soviet troops (and could they not have entered the war at all? And how would it have been with the blockade of Leningrad?).
Fortifications of the Mannerheim Line - a large-scale thing, 1938.
5) Hitler's troops easily overcame the poorly prepared (new) fortified areas, and on the old, retreating, demoralized and losing control of the Red Army, could not gain a foothold.
6) They did not have time to complete the rearmament and retraining (although the created reserve played a decisive role in the Second World War).
German soldiers inspecting broken Soviet equipment, 1941.
7) Stalin's hopes for Hitler's cretinism and disbelief in the competence of our intelligence officers allowed the Nazis to "parade" among the smoking wreckage of the Red Army, right up to Moscow (saved, as always, the heroism and stubbornness of our soldiers, and the Barbarossa plan postponed for a month - for help Mussolini in the fight against the British in Greece).
In the "bottom line"
- We (the Russian Federation - as the legal successor of the USSR) continue to be openly accused of collusion with the Nazis, even the Poles who completely lost their fortune in that war, not to mention other countries (and the fact that you don't hear about it from the TV screen does not mean anything).
- We have Russophobic sentiments throughout the north-west of our border (Belarus is the only exception YET).
- The greatest losses in the war, the Red Army suffered precisely on those same (pushed back) lines, in 1941.
- Before the war, a huge amount of money (and who got all this?), Which the country badly needed, was wasted on infrastructure and logistics.
A German column goes along the abandoned Soviet equipment, 1941.