Throughout my activity on this Forum I have been a strong propagator of the idea that Stalin and his regime was not less responsible for the war in Western Hemisphere than hitler, maybe more. I have found a good link (actually a summary of an excellent book by a former officer of GRU - Soviet military intelligence). I can recommend books of this author wholeheartedly to all interested in military and historic subjects. Please, read the text - maybe it can form a subject of yet another good dicussion: www.patriot.dk/suvorov.html
I disagree with you on your fundamental point that Stalin put Hitler in power. There are clear reasons and groups in Germany in the 1930s that support the rise of Hitler, including business interests that thought they could use him for their own purposes - there's the Establishment you like, isn't it?
In politics there are always (at least) two more or less adversaries. Sometimes a little "push" is enough to tip the balance. I cannot exclude (or rather - I would be very surprised) if Stalin hadn´t used his absolute sway over German communists to deliver the necessary "push". As you know, the German communists were under total influence from Comintern. TOTAL.
Let Leo Trotsky speak: Two and a half years ago, the Left Opposition insistently proposed that all the institutions and organizations of the Communist Party should immediately turn to the parallel Social Democratic organizations with a concrete proposal for mutual action against the impending suppression of proletarian democracy. Had a struggle against the Nazis been built on this basis, Hitler would not be Chancellor.(1930) The capitulation of France is not a simple military episode. It is part of the catastrophe of Europe.(….) But in line with the general causes of the catastrophe inherent in imperialism, it is impermissible to forget the criminal, sinister role played by the Kremlin and the Comintern. Nobody else rendered such support to Hitler as Stalin.(….) By demoralizing the popular masses in Europe, and not solely in Europe, Stalin played the role of an agent provocateur in the service of Hitler. The capitulation of France is one of the results of such politics. (June 17, 1940)
I have a lengthy article, but worth reading. Let us say - a sort of supplement to the link given above: (…) The Zhukov document, was discovered in the Archives of the President of the Russian Federation some years ago. For ultimate security, the original twelve-page text had been handwritten by then Major General, later Marshal, A. M. Vasilevski, and addressed to the chairman of the USSR Council of Peoples Commissars, Joseph Stalin. The document, marked "Top Secret! Of Great Importance! Stalin's Eyes Only! One Copy Only!," was authorized and approved by People's Defense Minister S. K. Timoshenko and Zhukov, then chief of the Red Army general staff. A key passage in the war plan not previously cited in these pages reads: In order to prevent a surprise German attack and to destroy the German Army, I consider it essential that under no circumstances should the initiative for freedom of action be given to the German High Command[. I consider it essential] to preempt enemy deployment, to attack the German Army when it is still in the stage of deployment and has not yet had time to organize his front and the interaction between his service arms.[The word for "preempt" was underlined twice in the original document. -- D. M.] Thus did Zhukov propose to Stalin precisely what the German Army would do to his forces a month later. After completion of the first stage of the offensive, Soviet forces were to turn north and northwest to destroy the northern wing of the German front, thereby occupying East Prussia and all of Poland. Meanwhile, to the north, the Red Army would once again invade Finland. Soviet mobilization and deployment in the period January-June 1941 took place in three stages: · first stage, January-March, the call-up of about a million reservists, industry ordered to step up production of T-34 and KV tanks, first echelon troops brought up to strength; · second stage, April-June, second echelon forces moved up to the western border, Far Eastern troops moved west; · third stage, June 1-June 22, Stalin agrees to open mobilization and to advancing second echelon armies to the front. All these operations were to be carried out in secrecy, without the enemy taking note. Once mobilized and in position, the Soviet forces were to launch a sudden, decisive offensive against Germany and her allies.(…) The correlation of forces along the front from Ostroleka (Poland) to the Carpathians at the time of the planned Zhukov offensive was as shown in the table below. Red Army Wehrmacht Ratio Divisions 128 vs. 55 2.3:1 Troop strength 3,400,000 Vs. 1,400,000 2.1:1 Field guns 38,500 vs. 16,300 2.4:1 Tanks 7,500 vs. 900 8.7:1 Aircraft 6,200 vs. 1,400 4.4:1 The attack was to begin in typical blitzkrieg fashion -- without warning, with air raids on enemy airfields, and with heavy artillery bombardment of front-line enemy forces. The USSR would thus have had the clear advantage of superior forces and the benefits of the first strike. (…) At first the opening strike against Germany (Operation Groza [Thunderstorm]) was scheduled for June 12, 1941, but that the Kremlin later fatefully shifted the date to July 15. According to Meltiukhov: "Unfortunately, what we now know today was a secret in 1941. The Soviet leadership made a fateful miscalculation by not striking first." In the end Germany failed, Meltiukhov states, simply because it had neither the resources nor the reserves necessary to bring a long war to a successful conclusion. On June 22, 1941 when Germany launched its desperate attack, Stalin had some 13,000 aircraft to Hitler's 2,500. Moreover, the Red Army had an even greater advantage in numbers and quality of tanks (24,000:3,700). Stalin and his advisors knew that the Wehrmacht lacked all the essentials for a protracted war under conditions of extreme cold. Through their intelligence services and agents, the Soviets had learned that: German tanks were inferior to their own in both quantity and quality; Germany was critically short of oil; Germany did not manufacture cold-resistant lubricants; the German forces had not been issued winter clothing; Germany was dependent for its war effort on the import of many raw materials; and much more. Did Hitler think that May followed October in Russia? Had he learned nothing from Napoleon's campaign? Did he not know that, even if he reached Moscow, Russia would have continued the war from the Urals in the interior, far beyond the reach of German long-range bombers? By the end of the fourth month of Barbarossa, the German economy was already groaning. Fritz Todt, chief of arms production, advised Hitler to arrange for an armistice. Large-scale German tank operations had to be curtailed for lack of fuel. The only reason for Hitler's initial success, for Suvorov, was that Barbarossa was an entirely irrational decision, which the thoroughly logical Stalin could not possibly have anticipated. In Stalin's War of Extermination Joachim Hoffmann examines both the underlying causes and the ruthless execution of the war by Russians and Germans alike, in a thoroughly engrossing, systematic approach that is unsurpassed with respect to comprehensiveness, objectivity, and documentation. Hoffmann has made extensive use of interrogations of Soviet prisoners of war, ranging in rank from general to private, conducted by their German captors during the war. These interviews, combined with the traditional exploitation of open-source, unclassified literature and recently declassified materials, irrefutably dispel the myth of a peace-loving Soviet Union led by a trusting, pacific Joseph Stalin. Hoffmann's research confirms conclusively that the Soviet Union was making final preparations for its own preemptive attack when the Wehrmacht struck. Besides the POW interrogations, Hoffmann cites such military authorities as Dmitri Volkogonov, to the effect that Stalin needed only a few more weeks to bring his forces into complete battle readiness; Soviet military analyst Colonel Danilov, who agrees that the "vozhd" (commander) only needed a bit more time; and Colonel Karpov, who has written: In the early grayness of a May or June morning, thousands of our aircraft and tens of thousands of our guns would have dealt the blow against the densely concentrated German force, whose positions were known down to battalion level -- a surprise even more inconceivable than the German attack on us. By 1941, the Red Army's aircraft, tanks, and field artillery exceeded Germany's by a factor of at least six to one in each category. In that year, the USSR's paratroops and submarines, exclusively offensive forces, exceeded those of the rest of the world combined. Hoffmann makes manifestly clear that the Zhukov´s plan has long been known and analyzed. Colonel Valeri Danilov and Dr. Heinz Magenheimer examined this plan and other documents that indicate Soviet preparations for attack almost ten years ago in an Austrian military journal (Österreichische Militärische Zeitschrift, nos. 5 and 6, 1991; no. 1, 1993; and no. 1, 1994). The preponderance of documents uncovered in the past decade, including further analyses of the Zhukov plan of May 15, 1941, by members of the Suvorov school, should convince the impartial reader that: Germany was woefully unprepared for a long war; that the Soviet Union was not only armed to the teeth, but poised to spring in July 1941; that Stalin was Lenin's disciple in striving to advance Communism to the rest of Europe, especially to Germany; and that the governments of Britain and France were totally oblivious of the greater danger Communism posed to them when they declared war on Germany over its border dispute with Poland.The failure of the British, French, and American leaderships to perceive that the Soviet Union was by far the deadlier threat, even in 1939, was a mistake that has taken half a century to rectify, at the cost of countless millions of lives. The Journal for Historical Review, Volume 20 number 5/6 (Sept/Dec 2001) REFERENCES: · Samoubiystvo (Suicide) by Viktor Suvorov. Moscow: AST, 2000. 380 pages. Illustrations. · Upushchennyy shans Stalina (Stalin's Lost Opportunity) by Mikhail Meltiukhov. Moscow: Veche, 2000. 605 pages. Illustrations, maps. · Stalin's War of Extermination, 1941-45: Planning, Realization, and Documentation by Joachim Hoffmann. Capshaw, Ala.: Theses and Dissertations Press, 2001. 415 pages.
Yet another appetizer: General Alfred Jodl before the Nuremberg Tribunal about Germany's "Barbarossa" attack: It was undeniably a purely preventive war. What we found out later on was the certainty of enormous Russian military preparations opposite our frontier. I will dispense with details, but I can only say that although we succeeded in a tactical surprise as to the day and the hour, it was no strategic surprise. Russia was fully prepared for war. Andrei Vlassov, a prominent Soviet Russian general who had been captured by the Germans. During a conversation in 1942 with SS general Richard Hildebrandt, he was asked if Stalin had intended to attack Germany, and if so, when. As Hildebrandt later related: Vlassov responded by saying that the attack was planned for August-September 1941. The Russians had been preparing the attack since the beginning of the year, which took quite a while because of the poor Russian railroad network. Hitler had sized up the situation entirely correctly, and had struck directly into the Russian buildup. This, said Vlassov, is the reason for the tremendous initial German successes.
sorry to be a kiljoy.... but why this obession with russian intentions pre barbarossa? i think it is common knowledge that a war between germany and russia was inevitable... just a question of who would attack first!! The germans beat the russians to it thats all.
this is a sort of family obsession. my Grandfather was a captain in one of those rare BT7s that survived the first time and managed to escape encirclement near Lvov with his tank company. Later he hs trained ca. 300 tank commanders in military camps behind front. (He became an Israeli officer after 1947 - a long story). He told me about the extremely extensive and intensive preparations for war since the middle of the 30s. There was only offensive operations on the program before the war. Everybody knew that "we" are going to squash hitler. And now - the whole world is only talking about the guilt of Hitler for the war. Nobody´s mentioning the discreete help of Stalin to Hitler in 1932. Nobody´s among mainstream historians touches the subject of Soviet aggressive plans. Who writes that Stalin had 24 000 tanks and hitler 3500? Why nobody writes that hitler was not entirely lying when he said that his attack on Russia was a preventive war? That is the great problem I am facing: Why is Stalin´s role in the war still A TABOO???? Who and why doesn´t want the truth out? Maybe YOU can tell me..... :cry:
Probably a legacy of the WW2 propaganda of "those poor Russians who were attacked without warning by that nasty Hitler". Plus the Cold War and the lack of detailed historical documents etc coming out of the Soviet Union. Plus, during WW2, nobody cared, or wanted to know, that the CCCP had planned to be the aggressor. After WW2, I would have thought that much would be made of the fact, had it been known. It would make for great propaganda... I just think that nobody took it seriously, and that studying the CCCP was a little discouraged during the Cold War, and slightly downplaying their WW2 efforts was approved. No conspiracy, just ignorance
After WW2, I would have thought that much would be made of the fact, had it been known. It would make for great propaganda... Well yes and no. It kind of made good propaganda to portray the whole of the Soviet armed forces as dumb peasants who were completely fooled by the clever hun (Who was back on our side again by the cold-war) and only won through because they had the resources to take huge losses. With that in mind it would have made bad propaganda by the Cold war to say; "Actually those dumb commies aren't so dumb after all, they almost got the jump on the Germans...".
But you could ignore that fact altogether, and run with the "they were about to take Europe by force in 1941, and they're equipping to try again!" line. Or stick with the 'dumb Ruskie' line, and point out that they were poised to attack Germany, and had been building up for quite a while, but Germany beat them to it! And whalloped the Soviet attack troops hollow doing so, despite having lesser forces in terms of vehicles & aircraft. Ah, propaganda - where anything can mean anything... Maybe I should become a Spin Doctor! (just disengage my morality first...)
I´ll tell you what I think about it: IMO the western Powers were and are very much bound politically and morally by the ignominous Nurnberg Trials – a (still) shining example of international Justice. Second, and no less important: throughout the war and after, hitler was in all western media portrayed as Devil Incarnate, guilty of all the unhappiness of WW2 AND PARTICULARLY - THE HOLOCAUST – THE Central Event in the History of Jewry (understandably enough, but…). In this light, anybody questioning the devilish nature of hitler and of his schemes, questioning the unique guilt of THE NAZIS was automatically a veeery suspicious personage. As a Jew, I must admit with not a little shame, that Jewish Holocaust was maybe the most important factor why nobody was AND NOBODY IS, till this very day, inclined or bold enough to show that hitler was maybe sometimes a little bit right about something. And an opinion that Wehrmacht maybe saved western Europe form sovietization would be intolerable to the intellectual and moral establishment and powers that be. What about that, Gents (and Ricky)?
Well, in the popular mindset, it was because of the Wehrmacht (well, Hitler) that Eastern Europe became Soviet satellites... Sadly, the popular mindset is hard to change - especially when teachers subscribe to it as well. Why do most Britains still believe that all Vikings were 7ft tall, blond-haired, and wore horned helmets into battle? and Ricky? Well, possibly. The only problem is, plenty of historians have argued that Hitler was right about some things. Or even many things. David Irving is an extreme example - he's the guy who, IIRC, leads the theory that the Holocaust did not happen. Historians are not always put off by official disapproval. To be honest, I think the main reason is the hostile nature of the Cold War, plus a big chunk of Western Ignorance.
OK, OK, Gents (incl. Ricky): Establishment historians may say that hitler was right about this or that detail or maneouver. But the QUESTION OF GUILT is still sacrosanct. David Irving is a very clever man, even if not "professional" historian. I must say, his main problem is , IMO, that he seems to like hitler (besides his strong positive feelings towards Geramny in general). His "Hitler´s war" is the best example of it. I have read some of his books. I have visited Auschwitz (twice), examined the place form all possible and impossible sides (including the points which the revisionists point out).... Well, the people are right - no holes (I hope you know what I´m talking about). But, unfortunately also - not much family left on my Mother´s side (this side was Polish Jews) and of their friends, acquaintances etc. My opinion is that the tragedy of European Jewry not neessarily happened the way we are being taught. Anyways, Irving is a controversial man, a talented man, but not at all mainstream. Such people are necessary. It was a mistake to try to kill him professionally and financially in court in 2000.
