Barbarossa - a preemtive strike?

[KurtGodel7]

@Hobbes:

I haven’t read Surovov’s book but I’ve read quite a few comments on his theories. The following are a sum of those comments plus my own ideas.

Well, since Marxist theory was developed by Lenin and the Bolsheviks the idea was to spread the revolution to the rest of the world after it was consolidated in Russia. During the 1920s and 30s there was even an dedicated organization (Coninform, later Cominertn) to spread the revolution to the capitalist countries and coordinate the communist parties everywhere. But in how to achieve this there was a lot of discussion inside the Soviet Union, since some considered that it was required to develop the worker class before it was possible to achieve a revolution (and that communist was the ‘natural’ result of the development of human societies after capitalist), while others took a more revolutionary approach.

So yes, communist ideology typically saw the dissemination of regimes and the implementation of world socialism as its goal. But in real life, the Soviet leaders usually took a more pragmatic approach and rather waited to see if the opportunity presented itself, rather than trying to implement communist regimes everywhere.

One of the main causes which led to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was the Munich Pact signed between Hitler and the western leaders and the later occupation of Chechoslovakia by the Nazis. The USSR had a alliance with Chechoslovakia like France had but once the western leaders caved in to Hitler’s demands (and completely ignoring the USSR during the Munich talks), Stalin started tp realize that he couldn’t count on the UK/France to contain Hitler.

The Munich Pact also had another effect, which was to greatly influence German influence in Eastern Europe, which Stalin was eager to contain. The UK, France, Romania, Poland and the USSR tried to make a treaty to contain Germany in August 1939 but once it failed (no one really trusted one another) then Stalin turned and signed a Pact with Hitler, since he also suspected (suspicion of everyone being his trademark) that the capitalists had left him hung to dry against Hitler.

Since he didn’t want to get the short stick, the division of Poland and the Soviet occupation of the Baltic republics were part of a deal for Stalin to gain time since he knew that the Red Army was in no condition to engage in a major war due to the purges and its outdated equipment and it was not until 1942 that the Red Army was considered fit for offensive operations. That’s also another reason why Hitler had to attack the Soviet Union in 1941 - Hitler was afraid that by 1942 the Soviet Union would likely be prepared to deal with a German invasion.

Proves he was not afraid? He knew that Germany would trounce over Poland since the western powers were too far away to do anything (and they had already done nothing when Germany raped Chechoslovakia) why wouldn’t he sign a pact to get a buffer zone between Russia and Germany? Your logic makes no sense.

Again, it was Stalin’s suspicious nature. He wasn’t required to attack Poland when Germany did, but since he didn’t trust Hitler would keep his part of the bargain, he moved to take the portion of Poland that was earmarked for Russia once it seemed that Poland would fall.

Stalin was buying time. Above all, he didn’t want a war with Germany until the Red Army was ready and he believed that the oil and raw materials would dissuade Hitler from attacking. He also tried in 1941 to get the Soviet Union to join the Axis but Germany wasn’t interested since Hitler was already preparing to attack Russia.

This implies a lot of wrong assumptions: a) that the Soviets were ready to attack Germany while Sea Lion was taking place during 1940 (which it wasn’t and Stalin knew it); b) that the Germans would use most of their army for Sea Lion (which it wouldn’t, according to the plans).

This can all be explained by Soviet doctrine: in case of an imminent attack it was considered that the best defense would be to contain at the border and the engage and destroy the aggressor on it own territory. This doctrine was also the reason why the Germany was so successful during the early stages of Barbarossa: the Soviet armies were close to the border due to it, but they had no defensive preparations (since the border had moved due to Stalin taking half of Poland) and Stalin didn’t believe that Hitler would attack in 1941.

Ok, so you’re ignoring that Hitler had defended since the 1920s to take territory in Eastern Europe/Russia that he considered vital for Germany’s survival, and that he expected that, after the Battle of France, the UK would join Germany in a war against communism. Plus, even in 1942, the Red Army would not be in a condition of attacking Germany and facing the German Army, which had a lot of experience gained from conquering Poland, Norway, France, etc. Hitler himself considered the Red Army a joke, specially after the debacle in Finland in 1939.

Hitler did attack because he realized that the longer he waited, the better prepared the Soviet Union would be for the war (which was exactly the same logic he followed in invading Poland/France against the opinion of the German High Command).

I’m about halfway through Suvorov’s book. He’s addressed a number of the points you’ve raised.

First and foremost, he pointed out that the Red Army did extremely well against the Japanese in 1939. Zhukov achieved this by launching a surprise attack against the Japanese. After their defeat at Khalkhin Gol, and the destruction of Japan’s Sixth Army, the Japanese lost any appetite they might have had for conflict with the Soviet Union.

It was standard practice for the Soviet government to loudly celebrate any successes it achieved. In this case, it was completely silent about its victory over Japan. As the person in overall charge of the Soviet government’s censorship policy, Stalin nixed any story which related to Khalkhin Gol. Suvorov pointed out that if Stalin was planning on surprising another opponent with those tactics, silence would have made sense.

There is the impression–which I’d been under as well, at least until reading Suvorov’s book–that the Red Army performed poorly in the Winter War. Suvorov points out that the task of invading Finland was generally considered impossible. The Finns had created a defensive pale–a lightly defended area. The second layer of their defense consisted of the nearly impregnable Mannerheim Line. In order to pass through the Finnish defensive pale, it was necessary to walk or drive along a road. (The forest on either side of the road was typically impenetrable.) There were also snow-covered lakes, with relatively thin ice on top of the snow. These lakes were indistinguishable from snow-covered open fields. Everything looked the same, because it was all covered with snow.

Imagine a Soviet column moving along the road in this defensive pale. As the first few tanks or heavy artillery pieces are crossing a bridge, the bridge blows up. The demolition charges were built into the bridge itself (and so hidden from view). Moreover, the bridge at the rear of the column blows up as well. There are large numbers of land mines on either side of the road, preventing the Soviets from leaving. At this point, Finnish sniper units appear. They are on skis; and are far more familiar with the forest than are the Soviet invaders. They start by taking out the Soviet officers and tractor drivers. Now the column is stuck, unable to leave the road, and subject to further attacks. That was the defensive pale. Only heavy artillery could harm Finnish pillboxes (layer 2 of their defenses). Anything to be used on the pillboxes first had to be moved through the defensive pale.

Overcoming all that was generally considered a militarily impossible task. A task which the Red Army achieved in a few months.
In the middle of winter, no less. Having overcome Finland’s defenses, Stalin refrained from conquering the rest of Finland. Not only that, he began spreading the rumor that the Red Army had fought poorly in that engagement. Hitler believed these accounts, and concluded the Red Army was not a threat.

In the summer of 1940, Stalin did something very similar to Romania. The bulk of Germany’s strength was in France. Only 10 German divisions were on the Nazi-Soviet border, and none at all were in Romania. Under those circumstances, Stalin demanded and received Bessarabia. The Red Army could easily have conquered all of Romania; thereby cutting Germany off from the bulk of its oil supply.

In many ways, the summer of 1940 would have been a perfect time for the Soviet Union to invade Germany. He could have begun the war by taking away most of Germany’s oil supply, and by rolling right over the token force on the German-Soviet border. Instead he waited. Why?

Suvorov pointed out that the way Stalin came to power in the first place was by partnering with X to destroy Y. Once Y was gone, Stalin would partner with Z to destroy X. Then he’d destroy Z. At the end of this process, no one was left standing except him. Suvorov believes–and with reason–that Stalin intended to use exactly this same approach to international affairs. In this case, his plan appears to have been to partner with Hitler to destroy the Western democracies; then to destroy Hitler. Suvorov believes that the reason Stalin didn’t attack in 1940 is because he’d wanted Hitler to successfully launch Operation Sea Lion.

Imagine this scenario: the British Isles are conquered by the Nazis in 1940. Then in 1941, the Red Army defeats the Wehrmacht. At that point, there would be no one to stop the Soviets from occupying all of Europe, including Britain itself. Some British might even have seen the Soviets as liberators from their German oppressors. (At least initially.) From Stalin’s perspective this scenario would have been quite positive. Instead of having to defeat the Germans, and the French, and the British, he’d need to defeat the Germans only.

He’d set himself up nicely to go after Germany, after Hitler’s work was finished. His conquest of Karelia positioned him to take out the rest of Finland, whenever it became necessary to cut off Germany’s supply of nickel, or its iron ore from Sweden. His acquisition of Bessarabia put him that much closer to Romania’s oil fields. But he didn’t want to take Hitler’s natural resources away from him immediately. Not until his usefulness against the Western democracies had been expended.

[Der Kuenstler]

Glad you actually got the book I’ve been referring to and are reading it, Kurt!

If people don’t like reading, they should at least watch the youtube video link in my first post on this subject. Its not that long, and you may go away with a far different impression of Stalin and his intentions than what you’ve been taught.