O caminho da guerra

Stalin Prepares for War

The Chief Culprit: Stalin’s Grand Design to Start World War II, by Viktor Suvorov

An offensive, not a defensive, war.  But I am getting ahead of myself.

I have previously offered a summary of Suvorov’s book, and have since updated my “Timeline to War” to reflect information found therein.

With this post, I begin my review of the details in the book.  This will take a few posts.

The narrative – peddled both by the Soviets during and after the Second World War, as well as by many in the west – is that the Red Army was totally unprepared for war.  Hitler overwhelmed a clearly inferior Soviet army with his surprise attack on June 22, 1941.

The narrative is convenient for all parties except, perhaps, the Germans.  It ensures blame resides solely on Germany for the attack (technically correct, but ignores several inconvenient facts); it hides the intent behind Stalin’s plans for aggression; it creates the myth that the Soviets were innocent victims of a tyrant – Hitler; it aids the story of US support for Stalin and against Hitler.

The Soviet military buildup prior to the war is ignored.  The capability of Soviet military equipment is greatly downplayed – instead we get peasants fighting with brooms and picks.  Suvorov sheds light on these deceptions.  Following are some of the key points made by the author.

Tanks

If I had known that the Russians really possessed such a number of tanks…I think I would not have started this war.

Adolf Hitler, August 4, 1941 (P. 50)

It wasn’t just the number of tanks, but also the capability of the tanks.  Suvorov examines both points.

On January 1, 1939, the Red Army was equipped with 21,000 battle-ready tanks.  In 1939, Hitler started World War II with 3,195 tanks, the same number that Soviet factories produced per year in peace time. (P.50)

Of course, in 1939 Stalin and Hitler were allies – of a sort.  What of the start of the war between these two?

By June 22, 1941, Hitler had on the eastern front 180 tanks in the under-six-ton category [out of 3,350 tanks of all types].  Not one of them was amphibious and not one of them could compete with the Soviet light tanks.  Stalin, on the other hand, had more than 4,000 tanks in this weight category.  All of them were amphibious. (P. 56)

Pay attention to the dates of some of these events – Stalin was preparing for war up to a decade or more before Hitler attacked, at a time when the Germans were held down at least to some extent by Versailles.

Mais