State of the Soviet military in 1939

I don't think it says it quite like that (or at least it shouldn't).

There's indeed some controversy of that meeting and the speech. There hasn't been (yet) an original document available of the event - it was after all top secret and for very few persons only. It doesn't mean, that the meeting and and the speech didn't exist, as many have convincingly testified. Stalin's policy and thinking is not secret and all hints point to the same direction - as in that "alleged" document.

Here's some more by historian Mark Solonin:

http://www.solonin.org/en/article_comrade-stalins-three-plans

[SIZE=medium]"Stalin quite clearly expressed the main goals of his foreign policy all the way back to September 2, 1935, in a letter to Molotov and Kaganovich:[/SIZE]

[SIZE=medium]"The old Entente no longer exists. Instead, there are two Ententes emerging: the entente between Italy and France, on the one hand, and the entente between Britain and Germany, on the other. The more violent the fight between the two, the better it is for the USSR. We can sell grain to both of them so they can fight. It is not at all in our benefit if one instantly destroys the other. It’s beneficial for us if their fight is as long-lasting as possible, but without the fast victory of one over the other.”[/SIZE]"
...

1. [SIZE=medium]“The war is taking place between two groups of capitalist countries…We don’t mind them having a good fight and weakening each other. It wouldn’t be bad if by Hitler’s hands the foundation of the richest capitalist countries (England in particular) were shaken. Hitler, without knowing or wanting it, is unbalancing and undermining the capitalist system... We can maneuver and push one party against another so they fight better. The Non-Aggression Pact is to some extent helping Germany. The next moment will involve prodding the other party…” [/SIZE]
2. [SIZE=medium]“If we sign a mutual aid pact with France and Great Britain, Germany will give up Poland and start looking for a modus vivendi with the Western countries. War will be prevented, but in the future, events might take a turn that will be dangerous for the USSR. If we accept Germany’s proposition to sign a non-aggression pact with it, it will certainly attack Poland, and the intervention of France and England in this war will become inevitable. Western Europe will be subjected to serious disturbances and unrest… Everything should be done to make this war last as long as possible in order to exhaust both sides… Adhering to the position of neutrality and waiting for its moment, the USSR will be helping today’s Germany, supplying it with raw materials and food products…”[/SIZE]
3. [SIZE=medium] “... If the USSR had concluded a treaty with the Western Powers, Germany would never have unleashed a war from which will develop world revolution which we have been preparing for a long time… By having concluded a treaty with us, Hitler blocked his own way into other states. Economically, he depends upon us alone and we shall direct his economy in such a way as to drive the belligerent countries into revolution. A long war will cause revolution in Germany and France. We will supply the Germans so that they will still be hungry….… As a result of the economic treaties he opened our route into Reich. His war will exhaust Europe which then will fall in our lap. The peoples will accept any regime which will follow after the war.”[/SIZE]
4. [SIZE=medium]“There, in the West, the three biggest countries are at each other’s throats; when is the time to resolve the Leningrad issue if not under such conditions, when [their] hands are busy and we’ve been granted a favorable setting for striking them at this particular moment?… They are at war out there, but the war itself is sort of a weak one; it’s unclear whether they’re fighting or just playing cards. What if they suddenly make peace, which is not excluded...” [/SIZE]

[SIZE=medium]"The authenticity of texts #1 and #4 doesn’t generate the slightest doubts. They are from, respectively, a recording of Stalin’s words at a meeting with Dimitrov and others on September 7, 1939 (exactly a week after the war commenced) and from his speech at the closing meeting of the Conference of the Red Army’s highest-ranked officers on April 17, 1940.[/SIZE]"

[SIZE=medium]"Number 2 is the so-called “Stalin’s speech at the meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee on August 19, 1939.”[/SIZE]"

[SIZE=medium]"No one ever saw a genuine transcript of “Stalin’s speech from August 19”; there is no solid basis to assert that such a speech was delivered. In the "Politburo’s Special files” (or, to put it more precisely, in something that RGASPI offered to the public under that name), only one resolution refers to the date August 19, and the issue it pertains to is utterly unimportant (it treats a draft deferment for workers building the Akmolinsk-Kartaly railroad). It looks strange enough. In 1939 the Politburo was issuing on average (including holidays and weekends) eight resolutions a day. August, 1939 was a very busy time: they would be reviewing about 20 matters a day (one should take into account that there were very few meetings, as such: the decisions that Stalin made in a narrow circle of “comrades” selected by him were simply registered as “Politburo resolutions”). Is it really true that on August 19 the Politburo limited itself to reviewing only one issue of the third degree of importance?[/SIZE]"

[SIZE=medium]"In my opinion, document #3 (the “Czech document”) is much more interesting and authentic. This is a report by a group of Czech anti-fascists about the meeting that they had in October, 1939 with A. Alexandrov, head of the Central-European Department of the USSR People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs. The document was passed to the US General Consulate in Prague and then lay happily in the State Department’s archive all the way until 1978, when J. Kalvoda, an American historian of Czech descent, first published it. The main advantage of the “Czech document” is the exactly registered dates: the text was received by the General Counselor in Prague on November 17, 1939 and translated into English on November 20. This is a very important moment: the document that almost word for word repeats the formulations in the so-called “Stalin’s speech” was composed BEFORE Havas’ publication on November 28.[/SIZE]"

 

Karjala, even if Stalin did that August speech, the Russians will not realize it for LONG time (it will put the Soviet Union as an agressor state, which is definately not something to be surprise coming from Stalin, but somewhat many people will think that is).

Even if we don't have the supposed speech document, I belive that with the existent evidence of the Soviet Armed Forces, it's possible to evalute if the Soviets perceived they could or not fight the Germans in 1939. And if they could not fight the Germans in '39 due to Great Purge, Stalin also bears responsability for the situation. And we also have the secret rearmament of the Reichswehr, which was largely conducted in the USSR.