The City
1942 of Steel
1943
The Failure
of Hitler’s Costliest
Gamble
The Battle
of Stalingrad through
the eyes of British
and American
newspapers
The Foundation for Historical Outlook
The Battle
of Stalingrad through
the eyes of British
and American
newspapers
The City
1942 of Steel
1943
The Failure
of Hitler’s Costliest
Gamble
Éditions des Syrtes 14, place de la Fusterie
1204 Genève – Suisse
Editorial Board:
Scientific Editor: Natalia Narochnitskaya
Elena Bondareva
Konstantin Kosachev
Igor Nogaev
Vladimir Romanov
Author: Igor Nogaev
Editor: Daria Karpukhina
Designer: Andrey Nikulin
Photographs provided by The State Central Museum
of Contemporary History of Russia
Copyright @ The Foundation for Historical Outlook
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5
The greatest of all battles
This is an unusual book as the majority of the texts in it were written in the
distant years 1942 - 1943 by war correspondents sent to the Soviet Union by
the leading newspapers of the English speaking world. They travelled to the
front, met officers, soldiers and rear guard troops as well as ordinary Soviet
people sharing the burden of life in wartime. They succeeded not only in sensing for themselves but also in communicating to their American, British and
Australian readers the unique atomosphere created by the fact that the whole
nation pulled together in self-sacrifice for the sake of victory.
The role of the the press in those years cannot be compared to the role
of our newspapers today. Then there was no television, mobile phones or
internet. Newspapers were the principal source of information; they aroused
feelings and provoked thoughts. People awaited them impatiently and bought
them up in a flash, announcers read out their articles over the radio, people
read them and talked about them at home and at work. They were an important element in social and political life.
The war against fascism took on a planetary character and became global
not only in its geographical extent but also in its great significance. Hitler’s Nazi
doctrine of the natural inequality between humans and nations threw down a
challenge to all human culture and civilisation. The threat that nations would
lose the right to their own history and turn instead into mere material for the
Hitlerian project united everybody.
The front extended from Africa through the South-West Pacific to the North
Pole. The USSR, America and Great Britain became allies in that war, and
the “noble fury” of Soviet people, which welled up like a wave against the
occupants in response to the Nazis’ atrocities in Belarus or the Crimea, was
clearly understood in Coventry and Pearl Harbour. Once the Western Front
was reopened in 1944, the “spirit of the Elbe” was born - the meeting-point of
American and Soviet forces - which politicians have started to commemorate
in recent years.
The Eastern front of the Second World War extended for thousands of kilometres across Soviet territory. It absorbed the main forces of Nazi Germany more than 600 divisions - and it killed millions of Russian soldiers. The apogee
and the great turning point of the war, as all military specialists recognise, was
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without doubt the Battle of Stalingrad. The Wehrmacht never recovered from
its defeat on the Volga.
King George VI sent a sword as a gift to Stalingrad on the blade of which
the following inscription was engraved in English and Russian: “To the steelhearted citizens of Stalingrad, a gift from King George VI as a token of the
homage of the British people.” Winston Churchill presented this sword to the
Soviet delegation at the Tehran conference.
The US president Franklin Roosevelt in a special scroll wrote, “ In the name
of the people of the United States of America, I present this scroll to the City
of Stalingrad to commemorate our admiration for its gallant defenders whose
courage, fortitude, and devotion during the siege of September 13, 1942 to
January 31, 1943 will inspire forever the hearts of all free people. Their glorious victory stemmed the tide of invasion and marked the turning point in the
war of the Allied Nations against the forces of aggression.”
But maybe it is the words of American trades unionists which are even
more precious for us: “Every soldier of the Red Army, defending his Soviet
land and killing Nazis, thereby also saves the lives of American soldiers. We
will remember this when counting our debt to our Soviet ally.”
Natalia Narochnitskaya,
President of the Foundation for Historical Outlook
. . .and the headlines screamed
Stalingrad is a Russian city in the lower reaches of the Volga River.
It used to be called Tsaritsyn, and its current name is
Volgograd. Despite these name changes,
in our memory it will always remain
the Unconquered City of Steel.
What the Battle of Stalingrad Is
In the history of every nation, there
are battles which are rightfully seen as
decisive, turning points. The British still
remember their triumph over the Spanish Armada, when whole counties would
respond to the call to arms, and soldiers
posted around Tilbury were ready to give
up their lives for their country. The 300
Spartans of King Leonidas who fell at
Thermopylae are still today an inspiring
example of tenacity and courage to every
Greek. The Americans revere the victories
at Saratoga and in the Battle of Midway;
they give their due to General Sherman
and his brave army; and the whole nation
views the blood-soaked battlefield of Gettysburg as sacred.
The list of battles forever etched into
the annals of history as symbols of courage and tenacity can go on. Any battle, any
encounter, no matter where it is fought,
means fire, blood, and death. However, of
all the battles of the past, one stands out
without equal by its sheer duration, by the
number of casualties sacrificed to the altar
of victory, and by its significance for the
fate of Europe – the Battle of Stalingrad. It
lasted 200 days and nights, from 17 July
1942 through 2 February 1943. Nazi Germany and the Axis powers never recovered from their defeat in the battle.
The Battle of Stalingrad was fought
on such a massive scale, and it was so
bloody and protracted, that there is still
disagreement about the military and civilian casualty numbers in Stalingrad and
the surrounding communities and areas.
Official estimates suggest that the Nazis
suffered more than 800,000 casualties
during the Soviet offensive of 19 November 1942 – 2 February 1943 alone. The
Wehrmacht completely lost 32 divisions
and 3 brigades, with 16 more divisions losing 50% to 75% of their original strength.
In the course of the entire duration of the
Battle of Stalingrad, the German and Axis
forces lost a total of approximately 1.5 million men – a quarter of the Third Reich’s
troops engaged on the Eastern Front at
the time.
The people of the Soviet Union paid a
horrible price for this victory. Stalingrad
left deep wounds in the souls of Russians,
which are still open. The official Soviet
casualty count in the Battle of Stalingrad
exceeds 1,129,000 men, including more
than 478,000 of fatalities. Attempts have
been made in recent years to come up
with more specific numbers for Red Army
casualties in the Battle of Stalingrad. Total losses of Soviet “fronts” (the Russian
name for army groups) in and around
Stalingrad were approximately 1,347,000
men, including roughly 674,000 of fatali-
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ties. These numbers do not include NKVD
troops and militia1.
The battle on the Volga was one of the
most fateful turning points of World War
II. Winning the Battle of Stalingrad started
the process of liberating not only the Soviet Union but also occupied Europe. It
laid the foundation for the ultimate defeat
of the Third Reich in 1945.
The magnitude and significance of the
Battle of Stalingrad for the rest of the world
are truly tremendous. People not only in
Russia and the former Soviet Union, but
also in the other Allied nations – the US,
the UK, France – preserve and honor the
memory of the battle. The word “Stalingrad” has become universally known.
Why do we need this book?
So, this is yet another book about Stalingrad. Why do we need it?
A great number of books and articles
have been written about the Battle of Stalingrad. The authors explore the battle on
the Volga in fairly great detail, reconstructing the course of events, attempting to use
authentic contemporaneous evidence. Primary sources are certainly of a very special interest: orders, letters, instructions,
photographs, documentary film footage,
and a wide range of other historical documents.
The range of evidence is quite broad,
but we propose limiting our discussion to
a small portion of it – the newspapers of
the Allied nations. This collection presents
to the reader a small selection of articles
from as few as five British and US newspapers: The Times, The New York Times,
1
V.N. Popov’s “The Battle of Stalingrad
According to Latest Research” in Modern and Contemporary History, Volume 2, 2007.
The Chicago Tribune, The Boston Globe
and The New York Herald Tribune.
Why are we focusing specifically on
newspapers? Let us explain our choice in
greater detail.
Historians are usually looking for factual accuracy and are passionate about using authentic historical source documents.
They are not generally enthusiastic about
the media as a source of historical record,
at the very least relegating it to the role
of a secondary source. In fact, the words
“the media” have various connotations,
some of them negative.. Indeed, what can
a newspaper possibly add to the information about the Battle of Stalingrad which
is already available from other historical
documents?
The skeptics are right to say that, a
newspaper, in a sense, has a shelf-life of
only one day, possibly two or three days
at a stretch. This was especially true of
Stalingrad, since the newspapers were
describing the situation at the front which
was changing constantly. In addition,
newspapers could not receive timely accurate information about the progress of
hostilities, because current information of
that sort was strictly confidential. For this
reason, up-to-date reports of advances,
withdrawals, shellings, storms, casualties,
and such, published in newspapers, were
to an extent only an approximation, and
one must always keep in mind that these
reports are prone to have some amount of
error.
Besides, an accurate calculation of
casualties and materiel losses, an analysis of flanking maneuvers and a thorough
description of weaponry specifications
and performance lies outside the realm
of newspaper reporting. These matters
belong instead to the expertise of military
historians. This collection will have to
touch upon this topic, but only tangentially
because our primary purpose is different.
So what is our primary purpose? What
attracts our attention first and foremost?
What is our main interest in the new book?
We shall try to explain.
While we understand that the Battle of
Stalingrad is first and foremost an event
in military history, we shall nevertheless
attempt to explore its other dimensions,
attempting to present more of a three-dimensional picture, with an eye to the impact of this enormous battle on the minds
of the people of that time, on contemporary culture. Whereas we are not making
a claim of exhaustive coverage of our topic, we shall attempt to focus on exploring
changes in society and in the personality
of individuals. Looking through the prism
of the Battle of Stalingrad, we shall attempt
to explore the new consciousness which
initially was not particularly manifest in the
public attitudes in the Soviet Union, but
which was timidly trying to break through
to the light of day, like a spring blade of
glass would through the pavement. In the
words of the well-known US philosopher
William James, this new consciousness
is like a soft layer of sapwood underneath
the tree bark, where the growth of the tree
takes place. Let us elaborate.
On the surface, the Soviet Union was
the same socialist country aspiring to communist ideals both before and after the
Battle of Stalingrad. It remained the USSR
so widely known in the West. The difference between the two states of the USSR
- before and after the battle - appears very
slight, but it is this slight difference that
interests us in this study. We want to examine precisely those transitional shades
which emerged, timidly and hesitatingly at
first, on the overall cultural canvas of the
Soviet Union, but which, as we all have
seen, were much later to be responsible
for setting the overall direction of the Soviet Union’s and contemporary Russia’s
future development.
We want to look through the prism of
history the better to see and understand
our Russian origins, our culture, our heritage and our roots. After all, the Battle of
Stalingrad is not “just another battle” for
every Russian citizen. It is first and foremost the destiny of our grandfathers and
great-grandfathers, the bitterness of defeat and the joy of victory. It is our Thermopylae, our battle against Hannibal, our
Gettysburg. At Stalingrad, our forefathers
dealt a crippling blow to our Spanish Armada.
We often see the past in a somewhat
distorted way. This is inevitable because
society is in constant flux. Russia and the
West today are completely different from
what they were yesterday. Why does this
happen? Because people of different times
and different cultures perceive and understand the world in their own ways. And if
we want to look at the Battle of Stalingrad
through the eyes of its participants, we
must be careful not to impose our modern
perceptions, our stereotypes on the past.
We must attempt a dialogue with people whose culture is different from our
contemporary one; we must attempt to
reach into their way of life and learn to
understand their cultural language, or,
better yet, learn to speak it. This is called
a historical approach, resembling the “immersion method” of learning a foreign language, which forces language students to
consider not only grammar, but also the
entire cultural context of events, their entire background. This is the approach we
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would like to use in our perception of the
Battle of Stalingrad.
Therefore, we are not going to restrict
ourselves to mere political and military developments. Our objective is different – it
is to take the context into account. To accomplish this, we are going to need a special type of sources – Allied newspapers.
Unlike the Soviet press, they were much
less reserved, which makes them especially appealing for our purposes.
We did not set ourselves the goal of
covering complete information about the
Battle of Stalingrad, or covering everything newspapers wrote about the battle.
Our book is more similar to a soldier’s unfinished letter from the battlefield. A letter
from the front line, a message from the
past, encouraging us to relive the events
of the great battle on the Volga.
“This War Gets Very Personal”:
Allies’ newspapers are a living
record of the Battle of Stalingrad
Newspapers have yellowed from the
passage of time, darkening and becoming
frayed at the edges. Some fragments even
disintegrated when we attempted to scan
them. However, the letters stubbornly resist the implacable time, stand up to it, not
wanting to be deleted and forgotten.
Yes, we will agree with the skeptics
once again, newspapers indeed only live
for a day, but this is also an essential part
of their special flavor. It is precisely for
this reason that a newspaper can convey
the spirit of that difficult time. In general,
newspapers of that time are in certain
ways reminiscent of our Internet of today.
Indeed, a newspaper is more emotional,
but this is also its significant advantage,
because it makes it capable of bringing us
live, immediate reaction of the author to
the events. Allow us to corroborate these
claims with a handful of examples.
Let us take a tiny article on page 6
of The Times dated 28 July 1942 (which
means it was written at a time when the
raging battle was already in progress)
entitled “Red Cross Aid to Russia” with a
touching lead “Message from Moscow to
Mrs. Churchill”. At first sight there does not
seem anything special about it. The article is simply the words of thanks from the
Soviet chairman of the Red Cross and Red
Crescent Society to Mrs. Churchill for a
shipment of medicines, warm clothes and
other items sent from Great Britain for Red
Army soldiers.
“Warm clothes” and “medicines” are a
far cry from tanks and airplanes, but for
some reason this modest, unprepossessing article touched us to the quick. Why?
Maybe because the human mind just
works this way, identifying in little details
the manifestations of something great and
important: there is a whole story behind
the modest article in The Times – a touching story of help and cooperation – there
are the common people of Britain who
donated these warm clothes, sincerely
wishing to support our soldiers, there is a
modest correspondent. In a nutshell, you
cannot help but feel the sincerity. Some
people may have thought that this little
message would be certainly forgotten with
the passage of time, but is that important?
We did not think of it this way. We did not
want this part of our memory to be lost, to
be deleted. For some reason, the warmth
of this tiny article “rubbed off” on us, and
we have decided to pass it along to you,
our reader.
And here is the story of an older American woman who had studied Russia all
her life from books, and who made her first
visit to Russia when she was 62. She took
the Battle of Stalingrad to heart, as she
would a personal tragedy, and she has
a lot of empathy for the Russian soldiers.
You can read about this in a Daily Boston
Globe article of 21 October 1942 entitled
“This War Gets Very Personal”.
And here, The
New York Herald
Tribune correspondent, Maurice Hindus,
talks to Soviet people in his report of 15
July 1942 to find out
if the Soviet Union is
really going to sign
a separate peace
treaty with Nazi Germany. After talking to
them and getting into
the spirit of that time,
the correspondent
suddenly
realises
that Russians were
not even considering
surrender. So what,
you might say? The
thing is that the correspondent
accurately represents the historical atmosphere
of the time. For this reason, we have included Mr. Hindus’ this and other reports.
Another example. A correspondent
with The Times talks about how long Russia will endure, and whether she will endure at all, in his article “A Critical Hour”
of 29 July 1942, at a very difficult time for
the defenders of Stalingrad. One feels tension in his manner of presentation, in his
style – which makes sense, since the outcome of the battle is unclear both for the
correspondent and for Soviet citizens. We
hear “one feels tension”, “the outcome is
not assured”, and our imagination helps us
to feel that hot summer in Stalingrad which
was sweltering. As they say, get a good
feel for the way things were, soak it in. This
is precisely why we have included this article in our collection.
Here is another brave American – Leland Stowe, the Pulitzer
Prize winner, an astute
and risk-taking war correspondent, who wrote
for the Chicago Daily
News, the New York
Post, and the Daily Boston Globe. Almost like
Leon Tolstoy’s Pierre
Bezukhov in War and
Peace, who suddenly
finds himself in the
middle of the Borodino
battlefield, Mr. Stowe
appeared on the Soviet – German (Eastern)
Front and reported the
events from the Soviet
side, “this side of the exchange of fire.” So what
did he see? Read about
it in his own articles.
See, for example the 18 October 1942 story in the Daily Boston Globe under the title
“Why Petya Became a Russian Soldier at
Age of 12”. Mr. Stowe found himself on the
front line north of Stalingrad, near Rzhev
(much closer to Moscow than to Stalingrad), and indeed victory was not only won
on the Stalingrad Front as the entire Red
Army was engaged in a giant battle from
the Artic to the Black Sea. The Rzhev Front
was a very good “showcase” of that.
In addition, Mr. Stowe’s writing is so
colourful and masterly that we decided to
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include his articles, because, we repeat,
the main objective of our book is to convey
the spirit of that glorious and austere time,
making the society and the individual the
focus of attention.
These seemingly disconnected newspaper materials - all the yellowed clippings
and even a few scraps presented in our
book - are like brushstrokes on an impressionist painting: when you stand close to
the painting, you see only the individual
brushstrokes, but as soon as you step
away from it, the disjointed jumble of paints
terial with a foreword of some inevitable
comments to make reading these articles
easier for readers without any familiarity
with Russian geography, language, military strategy and tactics, and the military
aspects of the Battle of Stalingrad. To
make the text easier to understand, we will
need to say a few words about important
cultural realities which are either partially
or completely unknown in the West, but
are very important for understanding the
context of the events in and around Stalingrad. Readers already familiar with this
information can skip the sections below.
We offer below kind of a short guide
for Western readers who want to get to
know, or, rather, to get to feel and appreciate the realities of the Battle of Stalingrad and the background against which it
was unfolding.
Where is Stalingrad?
A brief geographical overview
and brushstrokes is suddenly transformed
into an actual painting. We will not bore the
readers by re-telling the contents of all the
newspaper stories, but instead will let the
readers discover them for themselves, and
feel their emotional connection to the Battle of Stalingrad.
We did not change or edit anything in
the texts, leaving them as they were. All
the more so because when professionals
write, the desire to change something simply goes away. The only thing we see as
necessary is prefacing the collected ma-
As the epigraph said above, Stalingrad
is a Russian city in the lower (Southern)
reaches of the Volga River. It used to be
known as Tsaritsyn, then as Stalingrad,
and later was renamed as Volgograd.
The reason for these name changes is a
separate topic well covered in published
research, so we will not dwell on it here.
To avoid any possible confusion, we will
be calling the city Stalingrad instead of its
current name, Volgograd.
In this section, we want to introduce the
readers to the territory where the Battle of
Stalingrad unfolded. What was the theatre
of the campaign like, geographically, during the Battle? What kind of terrain is it?
What other things define it and make it famous? What is its history?
Let us begin with geography.
The theatre where the Battle of Stalingrad was fought extended from North
to South: from the old Russian city Voronezh in the North to the old Russian city
Rostov-on-Don in the South (incidentally,
Anton Chekhov’s native town Taganrog is
nearby). Between Voronezh and Rostovon-Don, the River Don veers Eastwards in
a wide curve, giving this area its name: the
Great Don Bend. Further East of the bend,
another major river, the Volga, flows North
to South, which the Russians reverently
call “Mother” (for your reference, Russians
call the River Amur on the Russian border
with China “Father”).
The Volga flows into the Caspian Sea.
As a matter of fact, this phrase has a figurative meaning in the Russian language.
When Russians want to say “these is a
basic, textbook truth,” they use the expression used by Anton Chekhov to great effect in one of his short stories, which has
long since become a catchphrase: “the
Volga flows into the Caspian Sea” with a
meaning similar to that of “Rain is wet” or
“the Pope is Catholic” in English.
The strip of land between the Volga and
the Don is narrow – only around 70 km.
This strategic spot, where the two navigable rivers comes closest to each other,
the location of the old Volga-Don portage
where cargo and boats would be hauled
over land from one river to the other, and
the present-day Volga-Don Ship Canal
(opened after the war). Stalingrad, previously known as Tsaritsyn, stands on the
Volga and controls this strategic spot.
For the reader to get a better appreciation of these distances, we are going to attempt to transfer them to the maps of the
US, the United Kingdom, and Continental Europe. These comparisons certainly
would not be as exact as military maps,
only providing an approximation, but this
should be enough for our purposes.
So, let us first take a look at the map
of the US.
If we align the map so that Stalingrad
matches the location of New York City,
Voronezh would be in Canada, around
Simcoe Lake in Ontario (north of Toronto),
from were the imaginary Don River would
descent to the area east of Buffalo, and
then meander to the Southeast through
Pennsylvania, along this state’s border
with the New York State, and then would
slowly start going into a bend near the
Delaware Water Gap National Recreation
Area, Lehman Township, Pennsylvania.
After this, the imaginary Don River flows
through Allentown and Reading and continues across the area north of Washington, DC (via Frederick, MD), making its
way towards Strasburg, VA, ending its
course near Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge, Davis, West Virginia], which
would roughly correspond to Rostov-onDon on this map. Make a mental note of
this line: Toronto – Canaan Valley, we will
need it for comparison.
Let us now move on to the map of the
United Kingdom.
If we put Stalingrad in the location of
London, Voronezh would be in Northern
Ireland (southeast of Belfast, south of
Strangford Loch), from where the imaginary Don would flow, descending as far
as Anglesey, Staffordshire. Then the Don
River would meander to the southeast as
far as Birmingham and Coventry, and,
around Oxford or Aylesbury, would start
turning towards Reading and Southampton. After this, our imaginary Don would
flow along the coast to the Cornwall Peninsula. Let us make a note of this line:
Strangford Loch – Cornwall.
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Let us now look at the map of Continental Europe.
If we placed Stalingrad where Zurich
is, Voronezh would be approximately
around Lille, and the imaginary Don River
would make its course towards Rheims.
After this, the Don River would turn southeast, flowing south of Nancy, then turning
towards Geneva south of Strasbourg – almost following the Swiss boarder, north
of Lyons, forming its imaginary estuary
near Clermont-Ferrand – this city would
lie approximately in the location of Rostov-on-Don on the actual Don River. Let
us remember this line: Lille – ClermontFerrand.
We believe that this easy journey
through geography should allow the readers to get a better idea of the military theater in which the Battle of Stalingrad was
played out.
Now the readers would be quite right to
ask the question: what is this area in the
bend of the Don and Eastward towards
Stalingrad? What are the things for which
it is famous? What is its history?
“The Stalingrad Region. Steppes
And Quiet Flows the Don”:
A Brief Historical Note
The word “steppe,” which has found its
way into the English language, is defined
as an “expansive treeless, arid grassland
plain.” This Russian word was originally
used to denote the geographic region of
the Don’s Great Bend and around Stalingrad, extending a great distance in both directions – East and West – of this location.
However, this word is relevant for our historical background because in the Russian
cultural lexicon it is more than a geographic
concept; it is also a cultural and historical
concept, with its many facets and flavours
which are lost in English-language texts.
Let us take a look at what the steppe
is. This region has been known since antiquity. It lies in the present-day Southern
Russia and Southern Ukraine. The steppe
region is approximately rectangular (let me
remind here that we have agreed that our
maps and borders would be very approximate, as they would be if drawn on the
back of an envelope).
Steppe from horizon to horizon. The
great Russian author, Nikolai Gogol, described this expansive area as “the seminomadic corner of Europe”, while Russian chronicles called it the “Wild Field”.
Different peoples would cross this land
and settle on it, which Herodotus called
“the Scythians’ Quadrangle”, which has
its South-East corner in the Danube Delta. Its Southern border follows the Black
Sea’s Northern shore, ending at the Kerch
Straits in the South-Eastern corner of the
Scythians’ Quadrangle. From here, Herodotus would draw the line North, along the
shoreline of the Sea of Azov and the Don
(this puts the theatre of the Battle of Stalingrad almost entirely within the Scythians’
Quadrangle). The Father of History draws
the Northern border of the Quadrangle
very approximately, and we will follow his
example, putting it somewhere near the
52nd parallel, with some margin of error.
Further North, the steppe becomes wooded grasslands (wooded steppe), and then
turns to forests.
Many believe the steppes are a flat plain
but this is not the case. It includes hills,
some of them quite tall. Some of those hills
are man-made. These are Scythian burial
kurgans, or barrows, inside which archaeologists have found the famous “Scythian
gold”: silver, gold, and even glass cups,
beads, pectoral ornaments, animal figurines, quivers, and arrows.
So, this is the legendary steppe. Why
legendary? Because Herodotus, writing about the origin of Scythians, retells
a legend that says that Heracles came
here, to the Southern part of the area we
are discussing (Herodotus calls this area
Scythia). He encountered frosty winter
here, and, “he wrapped himself in his lion
and fell asleep, and while he was sleeping,
the horses from his chariot who were grazing nearby,” Herodotus goes on, “were
mysteriously stolen for such was the will
of Gods”. Read Herodotus if you want to
find out what happened next, but we will
digress from our main topic no further.
The ancient Greeks settled the southern edge of the Scythian quadrangle,
establishing the Bosphoran Kingdom,
which existed for several centuries and
consisted of the Greek cities of Panticapaeum, Phanagoria and many others.
Somewhere near today’s Rostov-on-Don,
in the mouth of the River Don, the ancient
Greeks established a city named Tanais.
They traded with Scythians. This area is
still an important agricultural producing region for Russia and Ukraine. The Greeks
imported grain to Athens from here, from
the steppes, which, among others, Demosthenes mentioned in his writing.
Many different peoples and ethnic
groups called the steppes their home at
various times: first, the Scythians, then the
Sarmatians came from an area beyond
modern Volgograd (the former Tsaritsyn),
followed by a string of other ethnicities
coming from the East: Bulgars, Avars,
Khazars, and Huns, led by the Attila the
Scourge of God who waged successful
campaigns against the Roman Empire.
Then, the nomads’ carts rattled along
this corridor – Pechenegs, Cumans, the
Jassic people, Iazyges. The Great Migration which affected the course of history passed through the Southern Russian
steppes, near the modern Volgograd-Stalingrad, across the Don and on to the West,
to Europe, to the borders of the Roman
Empire. Then Slavs and Goths moved in
to the steppes from the North. The Southernmost Russian principality, Tmutarakan,
emerged around the ancient Greek city
of Hermonassa (on the Taman Peninsula
South of Rostov-on-Don).
Then, warlike hordes swept along the
great tract of steppes from East to West,
now commanded by Genghis Khan, Batu
Khan, Mamai, Tamerlane, defeating, destroying and pillaging everything in their
path. As a result, part of these lands fell
under the control of the Golden Horde. In
fact, fierce fighting went on in Stalingrad
over the city’s highest point, the “Mamayev
Kurgan”, translated as “Mamai Khan’s
Barrow” – an ancient name connected
with Mamai Khan of the Golden Horde.
Over time, the Southern part of the
steppes fell under the sway of the Crimean Khanate, a vassal state of the Ottoman Empire, deriving most of its income
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from the slave trade on an industrial scale.
It was not until the rule of Catherine the
Great of Russia that the Crimean Khanate
became part of the Russian Empire, the
slave trade was banned, and part of the
Southern steppes was renamed as the
Novorossiysk “Krai” (frontier region) and
the Taurida Governorate.
The Eastern part of the steppes, in the
Great Bend of the Don River – the location of the Battle of Stalingrad – came to
be called the Lands of the Don Cossack
Host. What are these lands? Since the
Middle Ages, this territory bred a very special type of Russian people who tilled this
fertile land in the times of peace and took
up arms to defend their settlements whenever nomads threatened to attack. This
ethnographic group of the Russian people is called Don Cossacks, and the entire
area covered in this discussion is Cossack
land. The Cossacks were never subject to
serfdom, and the name of their land – the
Don – acquired a second meaning in the
Russian language, that of the “free land”.
The Russian adage “there is no turning
you in in the Don” (no one will turn you in
once you make it to the Don) reflects this
fact. The Bolsheviks abolished the Lands
of the Don Cossack Host as a distinct administrative and cultural entity.
The Russian author, Mikhail Sholokhov,
who won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1965
and who wrote the novel Quiet Flows the
Don, hails from the banks of the Don. This is
also the site of Stanitsa Veshenskaya, where
he placed his characters in the novel. The
American writer, Sonya Tamara, recounted
the country about the life and heroic deeds
of the Cossacks who fought here during the
Battle of Stalingrad in her colourful large feature article “On the Quiet Don” in the New
York Herald Tribune of 21 July 1942.
And finally, let us translate the word
steppe from Russian into the language
of associations. First of all, it can imply
the concept of nomads (especially when
modified by the adjective “wild”, which
evokes the notions of frontier, wild field,
wilderness). Second, the word “steppe”
implies free will in the sense of freedom,
even excessive, libertarian freedom, and
in this case the idea of wilderness goes
away. The name of the popular Russian
folk song “Steppes Spread Far and Wide”
(literally “Only Steppe All Around”) hints at
the taste of this freedom.
The place names of Stalingrad:
what are the translations of the
names of local communities?
Place names offer a convenient way to
study the Battle of Stalingrad. We wanted
these names on the map of the Battle of
Stalingrad, which are strange and obscure
to English-speaking readers, no longer to
be “silent,” but rather become full of meaning and to speak for themselves. In addition, we can reveal a little secret: after
you commit to memory the place names
below, you will have a general idea of
the key events of the Battle of Stalingrad.
We sincerely hope that mastering associations evoked by place names around
Stalingrad would make it a little easier for
English-speaking readers to appreciate
the attached newspaper articles.
Let us look at the map and read some
of the Russian place names you may encounter and which can be something of
a mouthful. Would you like to know what
they mean and what associations they
call up in the minds of Russian native
speakers? In fact, they hold many surprises.
Stalingrad
It is well known that city name Stalingrad translates as the City of Stalin. However, native speakers of Russian would
see this interpretation as too literal and
ignoring associative nuance. While formally correct, translating Stalingrad as the
City of Stalin overlooks a play on words,
which disappears in translation into English. However, the headline of an article
on Page 5 of The Times of 28 November
1942 contains a very accurate associative
translation, conveying these finer points of
language: “The City of Steel”.
As we have mentioned earlier, Stalingrad was known as Tsaritsyn before the
20th century. Some see the connection with
the possessive of Tsaritsa (“Tsaritsa’s”),
while literally means “the Dominion of the
Empress”. Others derive the place name
“Tsaritsyn” from the Turkish word “sary-su”
(which means “yellow, muddy water”), and
from “sary-chin” (“yellow island”) as another possibility. The town has been known
as “Tsaritsyn” since the 16th century. An
interesting fact: also in the 16th century, an
English traveler, one Christopher Barrow,
visited Tsaritsyn, evidently an employee of
the Muscovy Company. But this is only by
the way.
Kalach-on-Don
Kalach-on-Don is yet another community which is notable in the history of the
Battle of Stalingrad. It was here, in Kalachevsky District, that the encirclement of
Field Marshal Paulus’ 6th Army was completed on 23 November 1942, putting the
army into a “cauldron” of envelopment.
Once again, we see a play on words in this
place name. Ironically, the encirclement
closed around Paulus near a community
named Kalach, which means a “Russianstyle ring-shaped bread” (the word “kalach”
goes back to the Old Russian word “kolo”
meaning a circle or a ring). A person baking “kalach” breads is called a “Kalachnik”
or “Kalashnik”, giving us the family name
“Kalashnikov”, literally “the son of a kalach
baker”. This surname is very well know
worldwide thanks to the Kalashnikov assault rifle. The slang expression “to hand
out kalaches” (“razdavat’ kalachi”) means
“to deliver blows”.
Kletskaya, Serafimovich
It was from around the communities
Kletskaya and Serafimovich North of Stalingrad near the River Don – recall our geographical note on the Great Bend of the
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River Don – that the Red Army made a
strike against the Romanian 3rd Army covering Paulus’ Army flank (another strike
came from the lakes Tsatsa and Sarpa).
The ending “-skaya” indicates that the
word is an adjective. Kletskaya is an old
“stanitsa”, a Cossack settlement. We have
discovered a 1614 mention of a “Kletsky
Town” on the right bank of the Don, in
the meadows. According to legend, local
residents would make elevated “cages” of
timber during the spring high water, make
a platform out of them, and place their belongings into them during the flood. This
gave the Cossack settlement the name
“Kletskaya”. However, a Russian speaker
would also hear in it the word “kletski”, derived from German “Kloß” and which refers
to a type of dumpling.
We must say a few words about the
name Serafimovich. This is an old Cossack stanitsa, Ust-Medveditskaya (which
translates as “sitting at the mouth of the
Medveditsa (Mother Bear) River”). The
Russian author and a Don Cossack, Alexander Serafimovich, was born and lived
here, and the stanitsa was renamed in the
1930s in his honour. The surname Serafimovich is derived from the old Russian
name Serafim (Seraphim), the name of
sainted Russian monk Seraphim of Sarov
(Sarovsky).
Lakes Tsatsa and Sarpa
The Red Army dealt its second pincermovement strike against Paulus’ Sixth
Army from the direction of these lakes South
of Stalingrad (the other strike came from
Kletskaya and Serafimovich, as discussed
earlier). These names sound strange to a
Russian speaker because they have their
origins in another language.
The place name “Tsatsa” comes from
the Kalmyk language (the Kalmyks are a
Buddhist people within Russia). “Tsatsa”
in Kalmyk is a small clay figurine placed
inside a Buddhist stupa as a symbol of
Buddha’s body, speech and mind. Sarpa
is a Turkic word, presumably meaning
something like “the remnants of a river”,
although linguists are not completely positive on this.
Kantemirovka
We could not possibly overlook this
community in the Don watershed, approximately 280 km South of Voronezh, as
it means so much in the Russian military
history. Near Kantemirovka, the Red Army
struck another shattering blow against the
enemy to support the Stalingrad counteroffensive, advancing as far as Millerovo
(see below).
Kantemirovka was founded in the 18th
century and named after the local landowners the Kantemirs, relatives of Peter
the Great’s companion Dmitrie Cantemir
(Kantemir), whose son Antiochus Kantemir
introduced poetic satire to the Russian literature. According to family lore, the Kantemirs traced their lineage from Tamerlane
(Timur), and their family name Kantemir
(Cantenmir) was derived from the word
“Khan Timur”. However, Kantemirovka is
famous for giving its name for one of the
elite Soviet and Russian armor formations,
the Kantemirovskaya Division, which
fought in the liberation of Kantemirovka.
Any Russian man will look at you with respect if you say that you know the name of
the Kantemirovskaya Division.
Millerovo
Let us recall the line connecting Voronezh and Rostov-on-Don. A little to the
South-East of the centre of this line lies
the town Millerovo, which you would see
in the newspaper reports of the Battle of
Stalingrad. The Nazi forces pushed to-
wards Stalingrad (from West to East) past
this town, and it was once again past this
town that the Red Army advanced to the
West after defeating the invading forces at
Stalingrad. It is interesting to note that Millerovo was founded in the 18th century by
the Cossack Ivan Miller – a Cossack with
a Russian Christian name and a German
surname. This combination indicates that
the Cossacks came from different ethnic
groups, not just Russians, but also others,
including Kalmyks, and occasionally, as
in this case, Germans. The “Volga Germans” were colonists from the German
states who began to settle in this area in
the times of Russian Empress Catherine
the Great.
The Volga
The name of the River Volga, on which
Stalingrad stands, is derived from the Old
Russian word for water, moisture. In an interesting twist, a river in Poland, far away
from Stalingrad, bears a cognate name
Wilga, which might also mean “water” in
Polish. In antiquity, the Volga was known
as “Rha”.
The Don
Let us now move on to the name of
the River Don. Scholars believe it is of
Scythian, rather than Slavic, origin, and
it translates as “water”. They believe that
the word possibly has the same root (“dan”/“don-”/“dn-”), as river names Danube
(Lat. Danubius, Ger. Donau), Dniester,
Dnepr. Ancient Greeks had two names for
the Don: Tanais and Gigris. In his history
of Persian king Darius’ campaign against
the Scythians, Herodotus reports that Darium pursued the Scythians just across the
River Tanais (Don), apparently just short
of Volgograd - Stalingrad, or possibly right
to the city’s current site, however, the history is silent about the exact location.
Kotelnikovo
Kotelnikovo is a community SouthWest of Stalingrad which was strategically
important. A large German military force,
Hermann Hoth’s Fourth Panzer Army, was
massed here, driving a strong armoured
blow against Stalingrad from the South
through Kotelnikovo on 12 December
1942, which was successfully repelled.
The Russian word “Kotelnikovo” derives
from “kotel” which means “boiler”, “pot”,
“kettle” or “cauldron”, while “Kotelnikovo”
means a boiler smith’s place or house.
Ironically, the Russian word “kotel” (cauldron in English, Kessel in German) in military jargon also means an “area holding
large numbers of completely surrounded
troops”.
The River Tsimla and town
Tsimlyansk
As a result of its Stalingrad counteroffensive, the Red Army repelled the Nazi
forces from the Volga as far as the River
Tsimla, a right tributary of the Don, the site
of district town Tsimlyansk. This river has
about the same significance for Russia as
the River Spey for Scotland. A majority of
Russians are familiar with Tsimlyansky
sparkling wines. In other words, what we
have here is Russia’s famous wine country, the Burgundy of Russia.
Winemaking emerged in the Don area
relatively recently, in the 18th century. At
first, like a timid provincial, first coming to
high society salons of St. Petersburg and
Moscow, Tsimlyanskoye would stand shyly to the side, yielding the spotlight to its
famed competitors. However, over time,
the discriminating Russian aristocrats developed a taste for Tsimlyanskoye. As a
result, the sun-soaked, ruby-red wines
found their way not only to the feasts of
small provincial nobility, but also to high-
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society receptions, earning praise of connoisseurs among high-ranking Russian
court officials and even members of the
Russian imperial family.
The charming bouquet, a velvety, harmonious taste, and unique flavor brought
this wine its fame. Tsimlyanskoye would
keep the Russian aristocracy in high spirits through the long damp evenings of St.
Petersburg, warming their blue blood. The
Great Russian poets, Alexander Pushkin
and Mikhail Lermontov, mention this wine.
Anton Chekhov was partial to the purple
Tsimlyanskoye wines.
Place names can be fascinating. One
can easily write much more about this, but
we would not want to digress to far from
our main topic, the Battle of Stalingrad.
The Battle of Stalingrad:
Distinct Periods
Our purpose in this foreword is to help
the readers get a sense of the newspaper
articles’ publication dates. We will attempt
to give a reader without extensive knowledge of military matters and unfamiliar
with the Battle of Stalingrad at least a very
general idea of it.
We have placed the articles in this
book in chronological order. We are sure
the newspaper articles presented in the
book would complement our information.
So, the Battle of Stalingrad is commonly divided into two stages:
The defensive stage (17 July 1942 – 18
November 1942); and
The offensive stage, or the stage of
the Red Army’s counteroffensive and the
conclusive defeat of the surrounded Axis
troops (19 November 1942 – 2 February
1943).
We will discuss the defensive stage
and move on to the offensive later, but first
we want to digress a little and look at the
Battle of Stalingrad’s significance in geopolitical terms and discuss the preceding
events very briefly.
The Battle of Stalingrad: A Prelude
in the Shades of Brown
The defensive stage is taken to have
commenced on 17 July 1942. However,
we would first go back several months before that, in order better to understand the
background and the reasons for the first
stage of the battle.
In the spring of 1942, the Red Army
started its campaign with an attempt to
liberate a major city, Kharkov. Recovering from the initial shock, the Germans
counterattacked powerfully. As a result,
the Soviet troops suffered a serious defeat at Kharkov, which became known as
“the Catastrophe of Kharkov”. Two other
sad developments preceded the start of
the Battle of Stalingrad: the Red Army lost
two cities in the Crimean Peninsula to the
enemy: the port city of Kerch, and then Sebastopol, after a 250-day siege.
After the Catastrophe of Kharkov, the
Wehrmacht managed to launch a breakthrough to the Caucasus and Stalingrad,
to access the oil fields of the Caucasus
and the rich farming lands of the Don, Kuban, and the Lower Volga. After seizing
Stalingrad, the German troops intended to
cut off the Volga, the shipping artery used
for transporting oil from Baku (the modern
capital of Azerbaijan) and war materiel
from the Allies to the heart of the Soviet
Union.
The strategic intentions of the German
High Command are clear: developing their
push into the Caucasus along two lines of
attack: 1) towards Derbent and Baku and
2) from the captured Kerch through Tuapse
(which is already subtropical) and Abkhazia to Western Georgia. The first route
is quite realistic, and the day would have
been close when Wehrmacht would march
through the Caspian Gates of Derbent.
The second route (via Tuapse) would have
been problematic, because the Caucasus
Mountains come very close to the Black
Sea around Tuapse, practically without
any valleys running parallel to the coast,
which would have forced the Wehrmacht
to fight along mountain paths. This would
have been difficult in practice and would
have required heavy use of the fleet and
the airforce; besides, the local climate is
challenging, with very humid and hot summers and damp, snowy winters.
Why did Nazi Germany decide to attack Stalingrad and the Caucasus?
The fall of Stalingrad would make the
Urals vulnerable – one of the major industrial regions in the Soviet Union, where a
large amount of the Soviet Union’s industrial capacities were concentrated.
If the Soviet Union had failed to defend Stalingrad and had suffered another defeat here, the balance of power
in Eurasia would have changed sharply
in favour of Germany and Axis Powers.
The Nazis would have had a real chance
to establish control over the oilfields of
the Caucasus, pushing neutral Turkey,
with its memories of dominance in the
Caucasus still fresh, to drop its neutrality and join the Axis. This might have
caused threaten an escalation of hostilities not only in the Caucasus, but also in
Iraq and Iran, where Great Britain had a
strong influence at the time.
Take a look at the map: at the Southern
end of the Caspian Sea lays Iran, which
was on the Allied side in the Second World
War (which was why the Allied conference
was held in Tehran in 1943). Soviet and
British troops were stationed in Iran. British India (the present-day Pakistan) lay to
the South-East of Iran.
The fall of Stalingrad would have been
a signal for Imperial Japan, the Third Reich’s ally in the East, to go to war with the
USSR. This would have forced the nation
to fight on two fronts. There was an even
more frightening prospect in case Stalingrad had fallen: the Third Reich would
have been able to build nuclear weapons,
on which German physicists were already
working at the time. Moreover, Germany’s
ally Japan, with its strong physics research
effort, could have done the same. Japan
was working on its Ni-Go Project during
the middle stage of the Second World
War (named after the Japanese Physicist,
Yoshio Nishina).
Let us not forget about V-1, which Nazi
Germany would have been able to create
sooner, and then use this flying “retaliation
weapon” (Vergeltungswaffe) to defeat its
remaining opponents in Europe.
There was another reason for the German advance towards Stalingrad. The
Third Reich needed “living space in the
East,” “Lebensraum im Osten” or simply
“Lebensraum” in German. Russia was part
of this Lebensraum. The Nazis said that all
the peoples inhabiting this territory were to
be annihilated. However, these intentions
clearly went against the wishes not only
of the Soviet authorities, but also of the
common Soviet people. This was why all
residents of the USSR rose up to defend
their country, regardless of their political
preferences, regardless of whether they
loved or hated Communism or the country’s leadership.
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The Battle of Stalingrad:
the Defensive Stage
(17 July 1942 – 18 November 1942)
Let us now move on to the Battle of
Stalingrad.
The Wehrmacht launched a general
offensive in the East on 28 June 1942.
Heady from their military success in the
spring following the Red Army’s catastrophe of Kharkov, German strategists were
hoping quickly and easily to achieve the
objectives of their summer offensive as
well. It seemed that everything was working towards the Wehrmacht’s success.
However, the events of the first half of
July 1942 on the Eastern Front before the
Battle of Stalingrad showed that German
politicians and strategists were underestimating the strength of the Red Army.
By mid-July 1942, it became clear to the
Soviet High Command that the enemy was
pushing towards the Volga around Stalingrad, in an attempt to seize a major Soviet
industrial area and an important strategic
point. The Nazi troops broke into the Stalingrad Oblast (Region) on the night of July
12. The Stalingrad Front (army group) was
established at the same time. The Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet declared
martial law in Stalingrad Oblast on July 14,
formally making it a war zone.
To maintain their initiative and momentum, the Nazis were transferring more and
more divisions towards Stalingrad, removing them from the West and from other
fronts in the East.
The situation was very grave, which
was why the famous Order 227 of the
USSR People’s Commissar for Defence
was promulgated on 28 July 1942, boiling
down to the slogan “Not a step back!” explicitly prohibiting retreat without order and
establishing stricter discipline in the Red
Army.
The Red Army fought a defensive battle
outside Stalingrad from July 17 to September 12. The Germans launched an offensive against the city on August 4. The enemy attempted pincer strikes on the flanks
of the Soviet troops in the Great Bend of
the Don, surrounding them, progressing
towards Kalach, and breaking through to
Stalingrad from the west. However, stubborn resistance by the Soviet troops did
not allow this plan to materialise.
The Wehrmacht was forced to transfer
the Fourth Panzer Army from the Caucasus to Stalingrad on 31 July 1942, and its
advance units reached Kotelnikovo by August 2, creating a direct threat of a breakthrough from the South-West. The Wehrmacht advance was stalled in this area,
too, by August 17. However, the enemy
resumed the offensive on August 19.
The fighting in the Bend of the Don was
extremely bloody and fierce. Moreover,
the heat that persisted over the steppes
throughout the summer of 1942 turned
even moderate fighting into hell. The dusty
air, mixed with acrid powder fumes, became heavy and still. The frontline would
boil and roar by day like a volcano, throwing up black pillars of smoke and dirt into
the sky, by night illuminating the steppe
with bright rockets and raging fires. The
sky would become washed out, almost
colourless by day. The temperatures easily rose above 30 degrees Celsius. The
steppe heated up more and more every
hour, like an oven, tuning the air into shimmering haze.
The situation could change within minutes. The Nazis often resorted to their
favourite manoeuvre: advancing on the
flanks of Soviet troops with tanks, trying to
encircle, close the envelopment, and clear
their way towards the Volga.
23 August 1942 will go down in history as one of the most frightening days
for Stalingrad. Wehrmacht troops broke
through to the Volga North of Stalingrad
and attempted to take the city from there,
striking South along the Volga. On the
same day, the Luftwaffe savaged Stalingrad with a bombing campaign, making
approximately 2,000 sorties against the
city.
The Soviet command took action, stopping the enemy at the North-Western outskirts of the city. However, the Germans
continued to mass their troops there. By
late September, the Germans were focusing heavily on Stalingrad. The German
High Command was making every effort
to capture Stalingrad as quickly as possible.
In late August and early September, the
situation at Stalingrad deteriorated dramatically. On 2 September, the Germans
broke through to the inner fortified line of
defence around the city and were getting
ready to capture Stalingrad with their next
strike. This is what one of the Russian soldiers, a former secretary of a divisional
newspaper of 173rd Rifle Division, A. Makarsky saw: “On the night of September
1, [our] division headed to the frontline.
Only some of the detachments could be
carried by trucks. The infantry marched to
the front. On the third day, we could see
clouds of smoke in the south. They would
take on shades of red at night. It was Stalingrad burning. Many of us could not go to
sleep that night. We could clearly hear an
incessant heavy thumping in the still of the
night. These were the sounds of the Battle
of Stalingrad.” The soldier continues: “The
Battlefield was empty steppe, overgrown
with short, dry, tenacious grass. The monotony of the plain was broken by a few
hills, the fighting over which was fierce,
and some long meandering gullies, in
which our detachments were moving.”
The situation was dire, but the soldiers
did not give up. “In the treeless steppe,”
Makarsky goes on, “devoid of any cover,
they rose up in assault after assault under the enemy’s punishing fire. Those who
have fought in the frontlines, know what it
is like to assault the enemy over bare land
under exploding gun and mortar shells,
facing a stream of machine-gun bullets.”
US President F.D. Roosevelt described
precisely the current strategic situation in
his Fireside Chat of 7 September 1942:
“The Russian front. Here the Germans are
still unable to gain the smashing victory
which, almost a year ago, Hitler announced
he had already achieved. Germany has
been able to capture important Russian territory. Nevertheless, Hitler has been unable
to destroy a single Russian Army; and this,
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you may be sure, has been, and still is, his
main objective. Millions of German troops
seem doomed to spend another cruel and
bitter winter on the Russian front.”
On 28 September, the Stalingrad Front
was renamed as the Donskoy Front (under the command of Lieutenant General
Konstantin Rokossovsky), and the Southeastern Front became the Stalingrad Front
(under the command of Colonel General
Andrey Yeryomenko). Sailors of the Volga Flotilla lent a hand to the defenders of
Stalingrad: supporting them with cannon
fire, landing assault parties, carrying Red
Army detachments, delivering weapons,
ammunition and food to the city, taking the
wounded, women and children out of Stalingrad.
On 15 October 1942, the Nazis broke
through to the Volga on a narrow front
near the Stalingrad Tractor Factory. The
city was almost completely destroyed,
with great piles of rubble, bent iron, reinforcement bars sticking into the air where
buildings used to stand – a sight evocative
of hell. Positional war began, with fierce
street-to-street fighting. The enemy was
invisible; he was everywhere, snipers becoming especially active in the city: it was
never quite clear if a pile of rubble was just
that or a well-concealed sniper.
There was a menacing smell of astringent powder fumes over Stalingrad – it
was the smell of death. The destroyed city
became the sight of vicious, dogged fighting – for every street, every house, every
stairwell. Every building became a fortress. Things often escalated to desperate
hand-to-hand combat, with the fighters using everything to stand their ground, from
firearms to bayonet to knife to trench-digging spades. Desperation and the fighting
spirit, fear and fearlessness went hand-in-
hand. Sergeant Pavlov’s platoon achieved
an amazing feat of perseverance, as
twenty soldiers of different ethnicities held
a four-story apartment block for 59 days
[from 23 September through 25 November 1942], surrounded by the Nazis, fighting off assault after assault. This building
came to be known as Pavlov’s House. It
still stands today as a memory and as a
reminder. Civilians continued to live in the
building’s basement throughout the siege.
On 11 November 1942, the German
and Axis forces made one last attempt to
capture the city. They succeeded in breaking through to the bank of the Volga south
of the Barricades Plant. This was to be
their last success.
The defensive stage was over on 18
November 1942. Although the German
and other Axis troops had succeeded in
capturing the Great Bend of the Don and
the area between the Don and Stalingrad,
the plan of their High Command was effectively foiled.
The defenders of Stalingrad resisted
repeated attacks on the city by the superior enemy and retained an important strategic and tactical bridgehead for the Red
Army’s counteroffensive, which began
around Stalingrad on 19 November 1942.
The Battle of Stalingrad:
the Offensive Stage
(19 November 1942 –
2 February 1943)
Defeat of the Nazi Troops
Someone without a military background, looking at an arrow on the map,
designating the direction of the main strike,
may have a hard time figuring out where
the military strategic talent lies. They might
even say, “Anyone could do that – just go
and draw an arrow!” What difference does
it make if the arrow is drawn here or there?
What does it change? A person without
military background or training will find it
very hard to solve this general’s puzzle,
and so pages discussing military operations would seem very boring, making it
tempting to skip a few pages. That would
be a big loss. Studying military operations
can be quite fascinating.
Every arrow has a very specific meaning. Let us attempt to figure out what the
idea of the Red Army’s counteroffensive at
Stalingrad was.
Organising an offensive operation is a
complex and great task. One has to calculate the strike precisely, but to do that,
one has to know where to aim that strike.
A military commander is like an acupuncturist in this task, who must know precisely
where to put in his needle – a mistake can
be fatal, which was what happened during
the “Catastrophe of Kharkov” early on in
the Stalingrad campaign.
A military commander must know the
disposition of enemy troops: where the enemy has his guns, where are his aircraft,
where are his engineering troops. Even
that is not enough, a commander must the
overall picture in dynamics, as it is changing: is the enemy moving his formations
and divisions and where; one has to have
a very precise idea of how the logistics are
organised, whether fresh troops are arriving, how the radio communications work,
and, finally, how the enemy’s intelligence
works. An offensive is very simply doomed
without all this data.
Soviet military intelligence collected all
this information. Reconnaissance groups
were dispatched behind enemy lines, aerial and radio reconnaissance also was in
operation. The Red Army needed up-to-
date information. But that was not enough,
the Soviet forces also had to neutralise the
enemy intelligence group which had infiltrated Soviet-controlled territory. This was
the task of counter-intelligence.
We have not brought up the matter of
intelligence, because the Soviet command
started preparing for the counteroffensive
well before 19 November 1942. It was military intelligence and counterintelligence
officers who were, figuratively speaking,
in the first wave of the Stalingrad counteroffensive well before the military advance
began, following the decision to launch the
offensive, which was taken “in principle”
on 13 September 1942.
Surrounding the Wehrmacht’s armies
at Stalingrad – Plan Uranus – was envisaged as a strategic operation by three
fronts. The Soviet troops were to break
through the enemy defences on the flanks
– at Serafimovich and Kletskaya (place
names already familiar to you) in the
North, defended by the Romanian troops,
and at Lake Tsatsa in the South. After this,
both groups were to meet near Kalachon-Don. In addition, a massive blow was
struck near Kantemirovka in the direction
of Millerovo (code-named “Little Saturn”).
Preparation for the counteroffensive
was made in conditions of maximum secrecy. It was necessary to mass huge
numbers of people, weapons and military
equipment brought from Siberia, the Urals,
from Kazakhstan – all of which was clandestinely transferred to spots around Stalingrad and placed in the starting positions.
After engaging the German and Axis
troops at Stalingrad in attrition warfare,
the Red Army was preparing the largest
encirclement history had ever seen. An
operation on this scale was only possible
because the direction of the main strike
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was chosen correctly, because the formations for the offensive were put together
correctly, and because all preparations for
the offensive were hidden and carefully executed, while forces, vehicles and materiel
were used correctly in the offensive, while
the troops and their commanders demonstrated strong military skills in battle.
While the Red Army’s overall advantage in troops and materiel was relatively
marginal (going against the “classical” theory of a deep strike and a following offensive) the Soviet commanders could build
up a more significant advantage over the
enemy in the key points of the main strikes,
which went unnoticed by the German intelligence. This balance of military strength
meant that all the skill and perseverance of
the Soviet military was needed to ensure
the success of a grand military operation
to envelop a large enemy formation.
To support the advance of the ground
armies, the Soviet command put together
powerful gun groups. Armour, mechanized, and mounted units were to capitalise on the initial breakthrough and take it
deep into enemy-controlled territory. The
air force was to win and maintain air superiority and support the advance of the
ground troops.
So what was the art Soviet generals
demonstrated in the Battle of Stalingrad?
The successful defeat of the Axis forces at Stalingrad hinged to a great extent
on correctly identifying the right moment
for going on the counteroffensive. If the
Soviet commanders had not got the timing
exactly right, the entire counteroffensive
would have been bogged down, and the
Germans, in turn, would have been able to
launch a counterattack. We saw a fine example of generals’ miscalculations in the
“Catastrophe of Kharkov”.
The Soviet command had got the timing right at all costs. It succeeded.
Reconnaissance showed that the German troops in mid-October went on the
defensive on all sections of the Eastern
Front (all the way from Murmansk above
the Polar Circle to the Black Sea) but were
still on the offensive at Stalingrad. However, it was discovered that the Wehrmacht
was planning to switch to the defensive
mode here, too. Taking this into account,
the Soviet command issued an order to
the Soviet troops to go on the offensive on
November 19 (the right wing – the Southwestern and Don Fronts to the northwest
of Stalingrad) and on November 20 (the
left wing – the Stalingrad Front south of
Stalingrad).
Therefore, the defeat of the Nazi army
at Stalingrad was primarily a failure of the
German command, including German intelligence, which was the first to lose its
invisible battle against Soviet intelligence
and counterintelligence. Additionally, the
German command somehow “overlooked”
the fact that the strategic situation of the
German troops at Stalingrad began to
get worse even before the defeat of the
Wehrmacht, because (as the map shows)
while trying to capture Stalingrad, the
Wehrmacht over-concentrated its forces
around the city, forming a blunt salient bordered by the River Don North of Stalingrad
and by the Volga to the South. After moving the bulk of their forces to Stalingrad,
the Germans did not reinforce their flanks,
which were subjected to crushing strikes
by the Red Army.
In the light of all this, it is not exactly
clear what General Winter, who supposedly helped the Russian troops, had to do
with it. It would appear that General Mistakes-of-the-Nazi-High-Command played
a bigger role. By the time of the Battle of
Stalingrad, the German army had succumbed to a disease that destroyed many
armies before it – the disease of complacency. In addition, the German soldiers did
not have enough fighting spirit to prevail.
So what did have General Winter to do
with it all?
and the German soldiers of the First World
War. To test these words, I would suggest
a simple experiment for the readers: find
photographs of German soldiers in the
Great War and compare them with soldiers of the Third Reich.
Let us take a look at German soldiers
in August 1914. The first thing that catches
The Battle of Stalingrad
and General Winter
Weather can certainly be a very important factor in military operations but it
is never a decisive one. In most battles, a
combination of commander skill and soldiers’ fighting spirit - their readiness to sacrifice themselves - comes to the forefront.
If we present the defeat of German troops
at Stalingrad exclusively as the result of
General Winter’s influence, it would follow logically that the German troops were
composed exclusively from effete and
spineless people not capable of fighting;
furthermore, they would not have tanks,
aircraft or cannons. Was that really the
case? The facts suggest otherwise.
Underestimating the enemy always results in losing the fight. Soviet troops acknowledged the discipline, strength, iron
will and stamina of the German soldiers
– things they had witnessed many times.
Soviet soldiers never saw their German
counterparts as weak of will or weak in
physical strength; the Wehrmacht was a
formidable force. One could say that the
Soviet generals won the Battle of Stalingrad precisely because they realised at
all times what exactly Wehrmacht soldiers
were. So what was that?
The soldiers of the Third Reich were an
iron army, well trained and drilled. There
was a world of difference between them
the eye is the variety of human types: you
see all sorts of faces, some aggressive,
some less so, some clearly good-natured
with friendly-looking beards you would
not to expect to see on a soldier. You can
make out the faces of store-keepers, and
even university students who ended up
on the front God knows how, rather than
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professional soldiers. They are standing somewhat sloppily, their trench coats
poorly fitting. It becomes clear why during
the Great War there was room for fraternising on the Eastern Front, while in the
West, there were the so-called Christmas
truces, when the enemies would meet in
no-man’s land to exchange trinkets and
gifts, to make fun of each other as soldiers would, only later to go back to their
trenches. It becomes clear why the German Army of the Great War could produce
a soldier like Erich-Maria Remarque, who
went on to become a top author of the 20th
century.
The soldiers of the Third Reich were
a very different breed. If you need proof,
just take a look at footage from Berlin on
20 April 1939, when the Third Reich army
staged a grand parade on Hitler’s birthday.
They are tall, upright, seasoned soldiers
wearing well-fitting uniforms, their steel
helmets glistening in the sun – these fearinducing horned Stahlhelme – marching
thunderously in step, loud enough to damage one’s ears. Forty thousand people
marching for hours. Indeed, you see soldiers of a very different breed, not afraid of
heat or cold.
Look: their faces are completely different – these “Aryan” soldiers have no pity,
know no compassion. You would hardly be
able to meet them in no-man’s land, fraternise with them, and celebrate Christmas
together. As you look at these iron soldiers
of the Reich, with their unflinching, unblinking faces of steel, you would recall these
lines from Seneca the Younger’s work,
“On Anger”: “Who could surpass Germans
in bravery? Or in the speed of attack? In
their love for arms? They are born and
raised so that there would be someone to
bear arms, arms is their own concern, they
are not worried about anything else. And
who would surpass their endurance and
patience?”
German troops could deal with the frost
within the Arctic Circle, remaining a formidable fighting force there, as they attacked
British convoys traveling between Britain
and the Kola Peninsula of the USSR.
Even the Russian soldier’s epic poem
– Vasiliy Terkin, the widely-read poem by
Alexander Tvardovsky – reflects the power
and tenacity of the Second World War German soldier. The Chapter entitled The Duel
devotes almost all of its fifty stanzas to close
hand-to-hand combat in the snow between
a Russian soldier and his German counterpart, a symbolic description of the mortal
struggle between the Red Army and the
Wehrmacht. This is how the poem describes
a composite image of the Nazi soldier:
“Strong and agile, the German soldier
Was tightly wound, handsomely built, He could stand his ground firm, Not the one to run, You could forget about trying to scare
him. Well-fed on free grub, cleanly shaven, Taken care of, well-rested in his warm
quarters,
At war in a foreign land.” These are not empty words, as Soviet
soldiers always noted the excellent training of German troops, and the good supply
of provisions in the German army.
In contrast to those of German soldiers,
the rations of the Red Army serviceman
were often quite meager. Here is the testimony from the diary of Vladimir Etush,
a Red Army officer who later became an
outstanding stage and film actor and who
fought in the Caucasus south of Stalingrad
in 1942: “We were issued a full ration to
carry with us – buckwheat and rice, a little
flour, some tobacco. Rations for two fit
easily inside a gas mask bag.” And also:
“Just a little gruel for lunch or dinner –
nothing else on the menu. Sometimes you
would make some dough and make a flatbread (matzo). But this is a luxury – there
is not much flour. All food is without salt.”
In Vasily Terkin, the German soldier
comes across as a tireless machine handing out blows left and right; he comes very
close to dealing a death blow to Terkin.
Moreover, Terkin knew from the very start
of the fight that “he (Terkin) was the weaker one in this fight: the food did not compare.” However, the two fight as equal opponents, continuing to fight tirelessly even
after both are bloodied, with swollen faces, now one gaining the upper hand, now
the other. At some point, Terkin is feeling
“completely beat, exhausted.” Eventually,
Terkin gains the upper hand in the poem,
taking the German prisoner and bringing
him to his commanding officer to extract
intelligence, one could even say that the
German soldier represents Paulus’ surrendering army.
Winter was no obstacle for the Wehrmacht. The facts indicate that Nazi troops
were capable of operating even in much
more severe winter conditions – in the
Northern latitudes, around Leningrad, besieging the city for 872 days in a circle of
blockade although they failed to take the
city. (For reference, Stalingrad stands at
approximately 49 degrees north – at almost exactly the same latitude as Paris,
while Leningrad stands at 60 degrees
north, the latitude of Norwegian capital city
Oslo and the Shetland Islands.)
It is not the first time General Winter is
brought up by military historians. Russia’s
victory over Napoleon in 1812 was also
associated with this “polar commander,”
but this too does not correspond to the
facts: Napoleon retreated from burnt Moscow on 19 October 1812, well before really cold weather set in. The Wehrmacht
besieged Stalingrad for several months –
in August, September and October, when
General Winter had not yet arrived, with
hot to mild weather in the Stalingrad area.
Let us present a brief description of the climate in the Stalingrad (modern Volgograd)
area for the Western reader unfamiliar with
the weather on the Lower Volga.
The climate in the Stalingrad area is
continental, with moderately cold winters
and hot summers. The climate here between late April and October is quite similar
to that of Central Asia or the Middle East.
It is not an accident that the Don Bend is
one of Russian traditional wine-making
regions. Summers in the Don Bend and
around Stalingrad are long and hot, with
air temperatures reaching 40 degrees Celsius, so one would be justified in talking
about “General Summer”. After sweltering
summer heat, often without a drop of rain,
September brings long-awaited cooler air
with average temperatures from 15 degrees Celsius and higher. The average
temperature in October is 8 degrees Celsius above zero, dropping to around zero
in November.
The winter was moderately cold, with
frequent thaws breaking cold spells and
vice versa. Winter typically arrives in late
November and is associated with unstable weather. So the Wehrmacht had a full
three months to defeat its opponents at
Stalingrad (from late August through late
November).
The facts indicate that during the fiercest and bloodiest pitched fighting at Stalingrad (i.e. before the Soviet counteroffensive of 19 November 1942), there were no
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severe frosty spells. Below are excerpts
from captured Wehrmacht documents: the
battle diary of the General Staff of the German Army containing flash reports in the
Army Group B theatre of operations:
15 September 1942 - our armor units
go on the offensive in the Don Bend.
Weather: partly cloudy, occasional rain.
19 September 1942 - partly cloudy,
warm, moderate winds.
21 September 1942 – clear skies and
brisk winds in the south, overcast in the
north, strong winds, showers. Temperature + 16 [Celsius].
26 September 1942 – clear skies, sunny. Temperature above 23 [Celsius].
28 September 1942 – clear skies, sunny, dry roads.
13 October 1942 – overcast, clearing
up in the south, rains in the north.
28 October 1942 – clear skies, sunny,
roads in good condition.
And this is what the weather was like at
19:00 hours on 19 November 1942 (from
the current report of the German Army
High Command): “overcast, temperature 0
degrees [Celsius].
And yet the Nazis never captured Stalingrad. This was entirely a function of the
unbreakable spirit of the Red Army fighters
and of the city’s residents. These, and the
talents of Soviet generals, were the decisive factors in the Battle of Stalingrad.
The Battle of Stalingrad:
the Final Stage
The subsequent course of events is
well known: on 19 November 1942, the
troops of Generals Vatutin and Rokossovsky went on the offensive North-West
of Stalingrad. They immediately broke
through the Romanian troops, creating a
gap several tens of kilometers wide, and
began to advance South. The next day,
on 20 November, General Yeryomenko’s
armies advanced towards them South of
Stalingrad. On day five of the offensive,
breaking the enemy’s resistance, the Soviet armies met near Kalach-on-Don. As a
result, 22 divisions and 160 separate units
of the Sixth Army and the Fourth Panzer
Army, more than 300,000 Axis officers
and soldiers, found themselves in a circle
of steel and fire on 23 November 1942.
The Soviet forces tightened the ring of
encirclement by 30 November 1942, but
lacked the strength to cut and destroy the
enemy formations immediately. On 12 December, the Nazi High Command made an
attempt to break out the surrounded troops
from the outside near Kotelnikovo, but this
effort was stopped. The Soviet troops began
an offensive in the middle flow of the Don on
16 December, forcing the German Army’s
High Command to abandon completely the
idea of breaking out their surrounded troops.
The German command made an attempt to
relieve the surrounded troops by airdropping
suppliers, but this attempt was scuttled.
The Soviet command gave an ultimatum and a surrender offer to the command
of Paulus’ surrounded troops on 8 January
1943, to prevent unnecessary bloodshed.
Here it is:
“We guarantee life and safety to all officers, subaltern officers and soldiers who stop
their resistance, and the safe return of prisoners of war to Germany or to any country of
their choice after the end of the war.
All the surrendering troops will be allowed to retain their military uniform, rank
insignia and decorations, personal belongings, valuables, and commanding officers
will be allowed to keep their swords or
daggers.
All the surrendering officers, subaltern
officers, and soldiers will be provided adequate food rations.
Medical aid will be provided to all those
wounded, sick and suffering from frostbite.
Your response in writing is expected at
15:00 hours Moscow time on 9 January
1943 to be passed along with a representative selected by you who is to proceed in a
passenger car under a white flag on the road
from Konnyi Relief Track to Station Kotluban.
Your representative will be met by trusted Russian commanders in Area B 0.5 km
to the southeast of Relief Track 564 at 15:
00 hours on 9 January 1943.
If you should reject our surrender offer,
be warned that the troops of the Red Army
and the Red Air Force will be forced to pursue elimination of the surrounded German
troops, and you will be responsible for their
elimination.
The Representative of the Red Army
High Command
Colonel General, Artillery, Voronov.
Don Front Commander
Lieutenant General Rokossovsky.”
After the proposal of capitulation was
rejected on January 10, the Soviet troops
went on the offensive after a heavy artillery and aerial bombardment. In heavy
fighting between 22 and 25 January 1943,
they broke the resistance of the Nazi formation, cutting it into two. On 31 January 1943, the Southern group of the Sixth
Army led by Field Marshal Paulus stopped
fighting, followed by the Northern group
under command of General Karl Strecker
on 2 February 1943.
The Battle of Stalingrad was over. Soviet troops took 91,000 Axis soldiers and
officers prisoner between 10 January
and 2 February 1943, killing an additional
140,000 during the offensive.
The Battle of Stalingrad
and Changes in Attitudes within
Society: what is the “Indestructible
Wall”?
In the very beginning, we set the goal
of attempting to use the Battle of Stalingrad to look at the new consciousness
that was slowly, almost imperceptibly at
first, emerging like a spring blade of grass
through a pavement. World War II, and
the Battle of Stalingrad especially, left a
powerful impact on the minds of the Soviet
people, creating new attitudes in the spiritual realm. This did not go unnoticed by
the shrewd reporters for the Allied newspapers. They reacted literally to the tiniest
of tremors. Some examples follow.
During World War II, the USSR began
to encourage openly a return to the heritage of the time before the 1917 Russian
Revolution. For example, the 5 January
1943 article in the Times Red Army Officers To Wear Epaulettes reports that the
Soviet Defence Commissariat came up
with a shocking proposal that would have
seemed highly subversive just a few years
before: reintroducing epaulettes for the
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military. And they were indeed reintroduced
in January 1943 in the Army and in February 1943 in the Navy. The Western reader
may ask: what is so subversive about epaulettes? We will attempt to explain.
After the fall of the Imperial regime,
and starting in the 1920s, “golden shoulder straps” were associated only with
the hated aristocracy and “white guard
scum”. “Golden shoulder-strappers” was
a derogatory name which the new revolutionary “commissars” used for Tsarist officers. During the Russian civil war of the
late 1910s – early 1920s, those wearing
golden epaulettes could get shot by firing
squad; a man in epaulettes was always
under suspicion. Even former and retired
officers were persecuted. For example,
a former officer of the Russian Army and
future “father of television”, Vladimir Zvorykin, very narrowly avoided paying dearly
for failure to report to a revolutionary commissariat; Zvorykin later moved to the US.
Furthermore, the Times correspondent notes accurately that now, after twenty
years of oblivion, words like “soldier” and
“officer” were coming back into use, words
that were invariably associated with the
“old” Russian army, while the system of
“political commissars” was starting to be
abolished. These changes evoked great
hopes from the Soviet people.
The change was not completely free of
funny incidents. The Russian soldier epic
poem Vasily Terkin contains the following
scene. A Russian reconnaissance party
comes to an occupied village and meets
an old couple who are happy to see their
compatriot soldiers. The reconnaissance
party and the old-timers start a conversation, during which a Russian trooper suddenly tells the old man that he is an “officer.” The old man, who still remembers the
old regime under the Tsar, cannot believe
his ears, and asks, surprised: “An officer?
Ah so. I get it” and then “How should I call
you now? Mr. Lieutenant or Comrade Officer?”
The Soviet people’s attitudes to the
Russian past before the Revolution also
changed: the new generation of Soviet
people started to look at historical figures
and literary characters not in the context
of class struggle, but rather from the point
of view of general human values and historical heritage. Younger people started to
study the past before the revolution, feeling the continuity of tradition, feeling proud
of their national identity and patriotic.
In 1943, after Stalingrad, the Soviet
authorities did one more incredible thing:
they stopped persecution of the Russian
Orthodox Church. Let us take a little detour and go back another 20 years, to the
1920s, when severe persecution of the
Orthodox Church began and continued
through that entire decade and the 1930s.
The Bolsheviks sent tens of thousands of
priests to the firing squads, and imprisoned the rest; they shut down churches,
destroyed many of them, and either destroyed or sold to the West much church
art and many relics. Two excellent articles
“Bolshevism and Religion” (The Times of 9
June 1923) and “The Soviet War on Religion” (The Times of 29 May 1923) provide
a detailed overview of this situation. Even
20 years later, on 4 October 1942, the Chicago Tribune ran a critical article on the
state of religion in the USSR under the title
“Godless Communism”.
However, the situation began to change
shortly afterwards: the persecutions of the
“red Diocletians and Maximians” came
to an end: churches reopened, resuming
services, and on 8 September 1943, the
Assembly of the Russian Orthodox Church
elected Metropolitan Sergey of Starogorod
as the new Patriarch of the Church. This
was quite understandable: the war encouraged the general population and the army
to turn to faith.
In fact, the first signal that the authorities of the atheist USSR might be changing their attitude to
the Orthodox Church
began to appear very
shortly after Nazi
Germany’s
attack
on the Soviet Union
on 22 June 1941. In
his radio address on
3 July 1941, Joseph
Stalin made a fairly
shocking introduction:
“Comrades!
Citizens! Brothers
and sisters! Servicemen of our army
and navy!” In fact,
Communists
saw
the address “Brothers and sisters” as
subversive, because
that was the way a
priest addressed his
congregation. But the signal was given,
and people of the faith got the message.
New non-Bolshevik (in fact old pre-revolutionary) words and expressions started
coming out of hiding. Let us take just two
highly indicative examples: two new Russian patriotic songs, “Sacred War” (in the
summer of 1941) and “The March of the
Moscow Defenders” (late 1941). In their
significance, they compare to the British
hymns “Land of Hope and Glory” or “Jerusalem” and to “America the Beautiful” or
“God Bless America”.
The patriotic song, Sacred War, rehabilitates two “tainted words”: “noble” and “sacred”, which are used in a positive sense
in the song. What’s so special about this?
In fact, the Russian word “noble” is synonymous with “nobility” (“landed aristocracy”
or “gentry”). The word “sacred” evokes religious associations as well as a reference
to the pre-revolutionary,
“white-guard” expression “sacred duty to the
Motherland.”
Let us look at another great work of music,
one of the most inspiring
military marches of the
Red Army, the March
of the Moscow Defenders. The talented poet,
Alexey Surkov, rather
than quoting individual
religious words, put
an entire if somewhat
modified sequence from
a prayer into the refrain:
“By a wall indestructible,
by defense of steel, we
will defeat, destroy the
enemy.” The expression
“Indestructible wall” really stood out, because it is not a phrase
out of Communist vocabulary. Even someone unfamiliar with the rites of the Orthodox Church, would ask, how can an “Indestructible wall” “defeat” the enemy since
walls are usually made for “protection.
However, this would be perfectly clear
to a religious person familiar with the expressions of the Orthodox Church: the expression “Indestructible wall” is used in the
Russian language only in two sources: in
the March of the Moscow Defenders and
in the Akathistos for the Holiest Mother of
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God (the 12th ikos), and in prayers based
on it. Surkov was born under the Tsarist
regime in a peasant family, so he would
have heard the words of the Akathistos
from a very young age: “Rejoice, unshakeable Pillar of the Church. Rejoice, indestructible wall of the Kingdom. Rejoice,
for it will raise us to victory. Rejoice, for it
will cast down our enemies!” “By an indestructible wall” is a literal translation of the
Greek phrase “to aporthiton teichos” from
the Akathistos.
“Indestructible wall” is also one of the
epithets used to describe the Mother of
God, and one of the types of her depiction
in icons, known as “Oranta”: the Mother
of God stands up, raising her hands with
her open palms facing out, which is the
traditional gesture for a protective prayer.
The history of creation of the Akathistos is
quite extraordinary. It is supposed to have
been written by Herman I, Patriarch of
Constantinople in the 8th century, or even
by Roman of the Sweet Voice in the 5th –
6th centuries. The akathistos was written
after the Mother of God delivered her city,
i.e. Constantinople, from an invasion by
Persians and Avars in 626, or from an attack by Arabs in 717/718.
Where does the image and the concept
of an “Indestructible Wall” come from? An
old legend says that when an earthquake
destroyed the famous Vlahern church in
Constantinople, only one wall holding the
mosaic depiction of the Mother of God of
Oranta in the altar niche. This is why icons
like these were seen as “protectors of the
walls” and placed in a temple’s conch of
an apse. One of the best-known images
of an “Indestructible wall” is kept at the St.
Sophia Church in Kiev, while another, the
Oranta of Yaroslavl, is preserved in the
Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.
After the Battle of Stalingrad, the adjective “Russian” was used on equal footing
with the word “Soviet,” without any additional epithets, while the Russian people,
which had previously been the majority
pariah group, became a people fully entitled to use the name it has chosen for.
“Russian” and “Soviet” were no longer in
conflict with each other, as is reflected in
the epic war poem Vasily Terkin we mentioned earlier: it is the first literary work allowed to use the word Russia for the Soviet Union, and even to use the old turn
of phrase “Mother Russia”. And even lines
like: “May the Lord give you health and
protect you from a bullet.” In fact, Vasily
Terkin himself is a direct literary descendant of Leon Tolstoy’s Russian soldier character Platon Karatayev featured in War
and Peace.
The war the USSR was waging against
Nazi Germany began to be called a Patriotic War, in the pre-revolutionary tradition,
with the epithet “Great” added to it. The
other “patriotic” war in the Russian history
was its 1812 war against Napoleon.
We could cite other facts, but we do
not set the goal of presenting all the facts,
but rather use the little-known examples
to demonstrate the typical features that
emerged during World War II in the Soviet
Union, including examples after the Battle
of Stalingrad.
The Spirit of the Elbe
It is common knowledge that the expression “the Spirit of the Elbe” emerged
after the Second World War. The meeting
of Soviet and US soldiers on the Elbe became a symbol of mutual trust and military
cooperation between allies in the AntiHitler Coalition: the USA, the USSR, Great
Britain, France and other countries during
the war.
However, the spirit of cooperation was
born long before the seminal meeting on
the River Elbe. It began to find expression
almost immediately after Nazi Germany
attacked the USSR on 22 June 1941. The
media of the Western nations – the newspapers primarily, this “Internet” of World
War II – made a significant contribution
to the process of creating a collaborative
atmosphere between the Allies. Newspaper reports of the situation on the Eastern
Front, reports about the cruel truth of war
and about the Nazis’ atrocities, helped to
mobilize the people of the Western nations
to the battle with Nazism.
Newspapers played an especially important role in their battle against Nazi
propaganda during the turning point of
World War II that was the Battle of Stalingrad, when the outcome of the entire
war was decided. The Allied media picked
up the gauntlet of this challenge. Working in the demanding conditions of wartime, sparing no effort and no expense,
the newspapers of the Allied nations were
successful in reporting the truth about the
vast and bloody battle on the Volga to the
citizens of their home countries. The correspondents’ selfless work and professionalism, the well-coordinated operation of the
newspapers’ offices, provided the foundation for the successful fight against Goebbels’ propaganda machine.
This colossal task required people of
a special mindset and character because
war reporting is a special kind of service,
which, in addition to pure professionalism,
requires qualities like bravery and journalistic integrity. Journalists from Allied
nations knew that newspapers were read
within the family, at clubs, in the cabins of
North Atlantic convoy ships; they realised
what the printed word meant and what
its value was at wartime, when the future
of the people of the West and East was
hanging in the balance. This was why they
needed not only to report, on a regular basis, information about casualties, attacks,
counterattacks, but also to try to blaze a
trail into the hearts of the Western readers,
inspiring in them noble, brave thoughts,
making it possible for them to join, in their
minds, the defenders of Stalingrad on the
faraway banks of the River Volga.
This selfless work by Western journalists could not but find a response in the
hearts of the Soviet people. Russia is
grateful for the assistance our Allies’ media provided. Russia remembers and honours the memory of all those who with their
pen and word¸ sincerely put in their every
effort to bring closer the victory – our common Victory, which subsequently brought
about the Spirit of the Elbe, the spirit of military camaraderie and friendship between
our countries.
We will always remember this.
Igor Nogaev
35
07.42
07.42
39
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 11, 1942
Major Eliot Says ‘42
Nazi Drive Hints
German Sword
Is Blunted
Compares 4 Weeks Required to
Take Sevastopol With the
Seizure of France in Same Time
and Sees Huge Losses of Best
Leaders as a Cause
By Major George Fielding Eliot
Copyright, 1942, New York Tribune Inc.
The present German offensive on the
Don River is the first operation of 1942 in
which the German Army has shown anything like the striking power which it possessed in the earlier years of this war.
Even in these operations there is a
suggestion to be drawn from the official
accounts that the Germans are not making
the same degree of progress which might
have been expected under similar circumstances a year ago.
It is certainly not without significance
that in 1939 the Germans overran all Poland in three weeks, while this year it has
taken them three weeks to reduce a comparatively small salient south of Kharkov;
or that they overran France in four weeks
in 1940, while in 1942 it has taken them
four weeks of the most intensive effort to
capture the single fortress of Sevastopol.
German Sword Blunted
Undoubtedly, one of the reasons for
slower German progress in 1942 is the fact
that the Russian Army has become thoroughly seasoned and thoroughly familiar
with German tactics and technique. But
there is also some reason to believe that
last year’s campaign in Russia has blunted the formerly keen edge of the German
sword. This is due, in part, to the heavy
losses among officers, non-commissioned
officers and technicians who cannot be
replaced by others of equally high quality.
This same deterioration was noted in the
German Army during the last war and became especially notable after Verdun.
It was then that large numbers of temporary officers promoted from the ranks after
comparatively short periods of training began to make their appearance in the German
Army, and exactly the same thing is happening today. The «Pariser Zeitung» of April 1
carries a statement that specially selected
candidates are being appointed to officers’
schools, after three months' special training,
directly from the ranks of the army. This is an
expedient which the German high command
does not like to adopt and never does adopt
except on the compulsion of necessity.
40
But there is probably another reason
for the deterioration in the fighting quality
of the German Army as a whole, and that
is the effect of the pernicious principle of
the corps d'elite. Ever since the Nazi regime began its reorganization and expansion of the German Army in 1933, the very
best officers and men have been constantly weeded out of the mass of the army for
the benefit of the armored divisions, the air
infantry, parachute units, the mountain divisions and certain units of the S. S.
All these troops have been in the forefront of the fighting and have suffered disproportionately heavy casualties. In order
to fill the gaps in their ranks, there has
been a constant drain on the remaining
units for the highest types of officers and
men, and these corps d'elite have also had
the benefit of the cream of the recruits.
This has resulted in a steady lowering
of the quality and the morale of the army
as a whole, of the regiments of infantry
and field artillery which must form the
foundation of its power. Their natural leaders, their non-commissioned officer material, has been systematically taken away
for the benefit of the corps d'elite.
Gives Only Brief Success
It is a system which can give good results only for a short time. It enables a few
very heavy blows to be struck with overwhelming power, but in the long run it cannot stand up against a mass army of the
democratic type, which continues to produce its own leaders from among its own
personnel. The fact that such a system was
adopted by the Germans is one more indication that they expected to win this war
comparatively quickly. It is one more gamble which they have taken and which they
appear to have lost, for it is hard to see what
can be done now to remedy its ill effects.
Field Marshal Rommel's Afrika Korps is
a striking example of this system, for African service recruits of the highest physical
standards were chosen and put through
a special course at the Hamburg Tropical
Institute. Before the beginning of his last
offensive the institute warned Rommel
that he could not expect any considerable
number of replacements, as they were unable to obtain any more German youths
of the requisite standards. This lack of
replacements may have a great deal to
do with the fact that Rommel has been
stopped, perhaps definitely stopped, only
some seventy miles short of his goal.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 11, 1942
Maurice Hindus reports
Russia deeply changed
by war ordeal
Finds Many
of Revolutionary
Concepts Transformed;
Thinks Hatred of German
People Would Prevent Aiding
Any Leftist Set-Up in Reich
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1042, New York Tribune Inc.
KUYBYSHEV, Russia, July 9.
The war, like no other event since the
Soviets came into power, has subjected
to the severest kind of test a vast array of
Speak With Impassioned Frankness
It is too early to draw decisive conclusions, but to an outsider like myself, here
after an absence of six years, certain new
facts are too ob­trusive not to challenge serious re­flection. Consider, for example, the
significance of the Russian attitude toward
the Germans. On this sub­ject the Russian press, the Russian leaders and the
Russian people — above all, the Russian
youth — speak with impassioned frankness.
There is a hearty acceptance of Premier Josef V. Stalin’s pronounce­ment that
Russia is not harboring the least desire
for the destruction of the German nation.
Were the Red Army to occupy German
territory, it never would be permitted, it is
universally held here, to visit upon the German civilian population the depredations
and humiliations which the German Army
has been heaping endlessly upon Russian
civilians. Neither the military nor political
leadership would counten­ance such a
form of revenge.
The great names in German litera­
ture, such as Goethe, Heine, Schil­ler
and Thomas Mann, are as re­vered as
ever by the Russian masses. Yet Russian hearts are boiling over with hatred
to an extent hardly with parallel in the
history of Rus­sia.
“The Science of Hate”
I cannot emphasize too vigorously
the meaning in articles on this sub­ject
by two leading Russian novelists, Mikhail
Sholokhov and Alexei Tolstoy, which appeared recently in the same issue of
“Krasnaya Zvezda” (the arm organ “Red
Star”) and which were reprinted in other
papers all over the country. The title of
Sholokhov’s piece, which oc­cupied an
entire, closely printed page, was “The Sci-
ence of Hate.” Tolstoy’s article was entitled
“Kill the Beast”. The theme of the two articles was the same: Germans are enemies.
Sholokhov tells of a Siberian lieu­tenant
named Gerasimov whom he met at the
front, who so loathes the Germans that the
mere sight of German war prisoners can
arouse a paroxysm of rage. On investigation he discovered that Gerasimov had
been a prisoner of war of the Germans
and had escaped, and that his experiences had made him such a fountain of hate
that he could look only at dead Germans
“with pleasure.”
“Violently,” said Gerasimov, “I hate the
Germans for all they have done to our
41
07.42
revolutionary concepts, practices, sanctities and taboos.
Some, such as the collectivized control
of property and the prin­ciple of racial and
national equality, have gathered fresh momentum and fresh strength, while others
are un­dergoing a process of ferment and
transformation which is fraught with farreaching meaning for Rus­sia and the world.
42
country and to me personally”. And again,
“No one ever imagined we would have to
fight against such shameless villains as
the German Army,”
These words speak for themselves, as
does the impassioned concluding paragraph of Tolstoy’s piece: “Com­rade, friend,
dear fellow man at the front or the rear —
if your hate cools, look up, if only to the
imagination of your child… You will un­
derstand the impossible, get accustomed
to hate, let it burn within you like a vision
of a German black hand choking the throat
of your child.
In private conversation the lan­guage is
no less violent; one has to be here to talk
to people who have been under German
occupation to appreciate the depth of hate
and wrath the German depredations have
stirred. And the Russians know only too well
now that Ger­man peasants, workers and
others support the mighty military machine
which is ruthlessly devastating Rus­sian
lands and pogromizing the Russian people.
After a year of war the German masses in
the army are still fighting demoniacally to
subju­gate Russia and to annihilate not only
Russian culture but the Rus­sian people.
A recent issue of “The Historical Journal,” in an article on “The Idea of Patriotism
in Russian Litera­ture,” quotes significantly
a passage from “The Little Boy Without
Trousers” by the satirist Saltykov Shchedrin, as follows:
Greed Called Justice
“Who is the most heartless op­pressor
of the Russian working man? The German. Who is the most ruthless teacher?
The German. Who is the most dull-witted
admin­istrator? The German. Who inspires
the abuse of power? The German… Your
(German) civilization is second-rate: only
your greed and envy are first-rate, and this
greed you cheerfully identify with jus­tice.”
The other night a Russian mother said:
“My seven-year-old daughter asked if
these enemies of ours are real people. I
said, ‘Of course.’ Then the girl said, ‘You
mean people like you and papa?’ ‘Yes’
I said. ‘Have they children, too?’ Again I
said. ‘Yes.’ And the little girl, a little frightened, said, ‘Aren’t these chil­dren ashamed
of their parents?’”
Adhere to Creed of Equality
Though adhering unswervingly to the
creed of racial and national equality, the
Russian people, and especially the youth,
have a deep feeling about the guilt of the
Ger­man people. Only yesterday an old
Russian worker said: “Hitler gave Germany not only the hide but the heart of a
wolf.”
I cannot imagine any Russian, especially among the young people, wanting at
the end of the war to spend a single drop
of blood or a single Russian sunflower to
help any group in Germany to enthrone
The New York Herald Tribune, July 12, 1942
In the Mills Behind
Russian War
Behind the Urals. By John Scott
Boston: Houghton Miflin
Company…$2.75.
Reviewed by RICHARD WATTS JR.
THERE are few greater con­tributions
that can be made to the cause of the
United Nations and the future of world
de­mocracy than one with which adds to
the proper sympathetic under­standing between America and Rus­sia. Here are two
great, vibrant, re­awakening lands, with
many sharp similarities about them, that
can well win or lose the war and the peace,
and yet the knowledge they have of each
other continues to be dim and precarious.
It is because John Scott’s “Behind the
Urals” is a genuine addition to our knowledge of one of the most crucial periods in
the tumultuous history of the Soviet Union,
the iron ‘30’s, that it be­comes a work of so
much impor­tance.
There is nothing pretentious about
what Mr. Scott has to say. His is dimply
the story of what he saw and learned as an
American worker for five years at the great
new Soviet industrial city of Magnitogorsk.
From 1932 to 1937, he was electric welder, foreman and chemist there; he married
a Russian girl; he saw the city grow painfully, bitterly and cruelly; he watched the
terrible days of the purge, and, as a result
of a growing suspicion of foreigners, he
was finally forced to leave the Urals. What
he has to tell is quiet and modest, and his
story could have been made the basis for
either a Communist paean or an anti-Bol­
shevik denunciation. Wisely, it is neither.
Because he was bent on proving no
case and was in the happy posi­tion of being able to observe at first hand what was
going on in an important Soviet industrial
center, Mr. Scott is a convincing witness.
He is never emotional nor didactic, nor
polemical. He sets down what he sees.
But he is not a mere unthinking recorder
of what went on about him. He is aware
of the sig­nificance of events, even though
he is a coolly objective observer. In his detached but far from unfeeling record, you
see the heroic, ruthless and world-saving
struggle of the Russian people in sane and
historic perspective.
There can be no doubt these days of
the tremendous enthusiasm that Americans have for the heroic Rus­sian battle
against the Nazi foe. The second siege
of Sevastopol has become as great an
epic to us as it has to our Soviet allies. At
the same time, there still is an oc­casional
person who, despite the justification that
Munich and Chamberlain gave Russia for
the temporary Soviet-Nazi pact of 1939
and the inescapable fact that it took Pearl
Harbor to get the United States into the
war, holds it against the U.S.R.R. that it
didn’t come to the rescue of the demo­
cratic cause until it was attacked in June,
1941. It is one of the wise things about Mr.
43
07.42
any kind of new society, however Leftist it
might be. I cannot escape the conclusion
that Russia will want nothing so much as
to place Ger­many and the Germans under such control that they never again will
have power to unleash a holocaust on Europe.
44
Scott’s book that it understands the falsity of the idea that Russia went to war
against Nazi aggression only a year ago.
The Soviet battle began at least a decade
before that.
“Ever since 1931 or thereabouts” writes
Mr. Scott, “The Soviet Union has been at
war, and the people have been shedding
blood and tears. People were wounded
and killed, women and children froze to
death, millions starved, thousands were
court-martialed and shot in the campaigns
of collectivization. I would wager that Russia’s battle of ferrous metallurgy alone involved more casualties than the battle of
the Marne. All during the ‘30s the Russian
people were at war.”
Stalin knew that eventually the Soviet
Union would have to defend itself against
aggression from the militarized powers of
Germany and Japan. He knew that without industrialization and organization and
unity it would not be able to stand against
the mechanized assaults of Russia’s enemies. He knew that slow, inefficient, disorganized and ill-equipped Russia must literally raise itself by its own bootstraps. In
a dozen years it must make the progress
into industrial and military power that it
had taken the West­ern world a century
to achieve. In an age of iron Russia must
learn to live with iron in its soul. Ruthlessness was necessary to equip Russia to
face a ruthless foe, and the unrelenting
spirit was forthcoming happily for America
and Britain.
Mr. Scott makes no attempt to gloss
over the cruelty, the stupidity and the
horror that accompanied the grim Soviet
determination to create a modern industrial base that would enable it to stand
off the in­vader. There was waste and
savagery and terrible suffering. It is not
a pretty picture. But it is a heroic one.
Painfully, with much blunder­ing and ignorance and a great sacri­fice of life, the
Soviet Union did manage to pull itself up
by those bootstraps. It did so at a terrible cost, but who will say that the cost
was greater than the cost of defeat at
the hands of German? We of the Western world with our greater advantages in
technical knowledge and experience in
democratic gov­ernment do not possess
a record that enables us to be superior
to an ally that has given its blood to pro­
vide us with the opportunity to pre­pare
ourselves more comfortably.
Because Mr. Scott’s book, for all the
ugliness it presents, still is a record of
progress, of a great people painfully
raising itself to leadership in the battle
against world aggres­sion, it is a valuable contribution to a sympathetic understanding of our great ally. “Behind
the Urals” is not stirringly or dramatically
writ­ten but it possesses a keen eye for
detail. Reading it, you see the struggles
of the Russian people on actual, everyday terms of Rus­sian life. It is a cruel but
epic pic­ture.
Maurice Hindus Finds
Russia Inspired by Its
Pre-Lenin Past
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, New York Tribune Inc.
KUYBESHEV, Russia, July 11.
In these days of desperate fighting for
national and individual survival, the Russians, especially the new youth, are turning more and more for inspiration to Russia’s pre-revolutionary past. To any one
who knew Russia in the ‘20s and early ‘30
this is more than an anachronism.
Then, the Russians, especially the
youth, arrayed against the past all that it
was and all that it symbolized. I recall a
visit to a literature class in a Stalingrad
high school which was discussing “Eugene Onegin,” by Alexander Pushkin, Russia’s great eighteenth-century poet. One
after another the stu­dents denounced its
leading charac­ters as social parasites and
scoun­drels with no claim to the respect of
the new Russia.
I recall also a conversation with the
late Felix Kon, something of a dictator in
arts, who inveighed eloquently against folk
music, gypsy music and the church music
of Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff and other
Russian and non-Russian composers before the revolution.
Now there is a complete reversal of
that attitude. The other evening at the opera at a performance of “Eugene Onegin”
the audience, com­posed overwhelmingly
of young peo­ple, chiefly girls, was tense
and breathless with sympathy for the very
heroine whom previous school generations had disowned as alien and had excoriated as a parasite.
I was even more amazed when, at a
party at a Russian home after­ward, I heard
young people say they felt a bond of sympathy with Tatyana, Pushkin’s immortal
heroine. True, they admitted, she was a
member of the leisure class and had no
interest in the plight of the peasantry, but
she was a sympathetic human being and
a Russian, therefore close to their own
hearts.
Past Is Rediscovered
More for the benefit of the new youth,
which is most responsive to it, Russian
cultural agencies — schools, clubs, press,
lectures and radio — eagerly and indefatigably are rediscovering more and more
the nation’s past, and are reinterpret­ing its
glory and grandeur. On a poster which I
can see from my room there appears underneath a portrait of Kutuzov, commander in chief of the Russian armies against
Napoleon, a quotation by Premier Josef V.
Stalin in flaming letters, reading: “Let the
daring spirit of our great ancestors inspire
you in this war.”
In addition to Kutuzov, other vic­torious
commanders during the cru­cial period of
Russian history are as widely publicized
now as the names of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, the fathers of Marxian Socialism.
Even Ivan the Terrible, now known only
as Ivan, has been res­cued from the disrepute he held in the days before the Soviet
revolu­tion. Alexey Tolstoy, a leading novelist, has just finished a play about him.
45
07.42
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 13, 1942
46
In an interview, Tolstoy said: ‘Ivan the
Terrible, who is one of the most remarkable figures in Rus­sian history… represents the Russian in all his grandiose
ambi­tions, his fervid will and his inex­
haustible possibilities and power even
with his shortcomings.”
since the coming of the Soviets, feels
it has roots not only in the proletarian
masses, but in its own soil, its own tradition, its own heroes — many utterly alien
to the proletariat—above all in its own
history.
It completely rejects the economics and
politics of the pre-Soviet regimes, but it accepts and emulates the national cultural
achievements. It feels a fresh surge of nation pride and patriotic sentiment under the
present pressure, and many of the emotions over former intolerances and social
differences are melting away — not all, but
many Historic personages and literature characters are appraised now not in
terms of class origin, but in human values
and national attainments.
Girl Martyr’s Attitude
Like Peter, now known not as Peter
the Great but as Peter the First, Ivan IV
consolidated the Russian state; therefore,
in the Soviet view, he is deserving of the
recognition of present-day Russia.
The rediscovery of Russia’s past applies not to institutions such as private
enterprise which were completely done
away with, nor to the political state, but
to personages and movements, whether
initiated under the Romanoffs or the revolutionaries which contributed to the development of the Russian people and the
Russian nation. Names which were once
in complete oblivion have been lifted to
a pedestal for all, especially the youth, to
see, esteem and worship.
This new attitude toward the past is
fraught with incalculable meaning for the
immediate and distant future of Soviet
Russia. The new youth, more than any
Enlightening is the biography of Zoya
Kosmodemyanskaya,
eighteen-yearold high school girl, whom the Germans
hanged and who now is the most dramatic war hero and almost a saint to the
youth of her genera­tion. Kutuzov and
Suvorov were among her great idols. Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” was her favorite
book. She had copied it by hand so as
to better fix in mind the descrip­tion of the
Battle of Borodino.
She is depicted as having studied incessantly the biographies of Russian leaders of pre-Soviet time, and also the ancient
Russian ballads. Her school composition
on Ilya Murometz, hero of these ballads,
is full of love for Russia’s past, Russia’s
land, the Russian tongue and the Russian
people. Millions of Russian boys and girls
are reading Zoya’s biography, certain to
be deeply impressed by it and to emulate
her ways and thought.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 15, 1942
The Urgency
of the Hour
As the devastating hordes of Germany
roll and spread onward through southern
Russia, as their steel-clad fingers reach
and claw for the last lifelines of the Russian defense, it is impossible not to feel
again that sense of desperate urgency
which darkened the spirit but nerved the
hand and brain twenty-four years ago, in
the black spring of 1918.
Younger men and women may have
forgotten; the older will not miss the parallel. The great beast had seemed to be
tiring at last. In three years of bloody struggle the Allies had not managed to dent its
carcass; its victories had been continuous
and its victims many, but surely the strain
was beginning to tell, the Americans were
beginning to arrive, one could allow oneself
to hope that the end was on the horizon.
And at that moment, on March 21, 1918,
the beast struck with a greater power than
it had ever shown before. In a few days
it had rolled back the British and French
lines over distances the Allies had never
been able to win in long months and with
ghastly losses. Strategic rail lines fell as
they are falling now in the Don Valley; in a
few days more it was clawing at the gates
of Amiens, like Voronezh or Stalingrad
today a vital key, the loss of which would
have meant the division of the defending
armies and very possibly the loss of the
war. And through April and May the beast
was to strike again and yet again with
almost equally smashing success; while,
as the lines bulged and sagged under the
blows, the grim possibility grew that all the
Allied suffering and sacrifice might even
yet end in failure.
Today, with the Russian lines cracking under the terrific weight of the attack,
with a more and more desperate note in
the Russian appeals for the help which
they believed they had been promised in
the negotiations over a month ago, the
situation is similar, one has the same
feeling of supreme crisis in the air. But
what one misses is any sense of the
same urgency in meeting it, of that vigor in action and promptness in resolve
which twenty-four years ago just managed to turn the tide of imminent defeat
into swift and final victory. The spirit was
darkened in those days, but the hand
was not paralyzed. In the extreme emergency all the bickerings and jealousies
that had divided the Allied strategy and
Allied counsels were swept away and a
unified command appeared over night.
Pershing made his famous offer of everything he had available; American troops
were tumbled into transports and sent on
their way as rapidly as it was possible to
47
07.42
To an outsider like myself, it is becoming increasingly obvious that the continuous dramatization and glorification of Russia’s past is helping to make Russia now
more na­tional than ever in her history.
There is not a villager, however remote
geographically, but is gaining a new and
heightened appreciation of the world his
Russian ancestors built and of the contribution it is making in the progress of the
new Russia. What is even more signifi­cant
is that the new nationalism is inculcating in
Russia’s youth a loyalty to the motherland
above all.
48
do it; risks were taken, a mighty effort
was made; the great beast was stopped
in his tracks and almost immediately he
collapsed.
What is being done or can be done
today this newspaper does not profess
to know. But if there is unity of plan and
action in the staffs, the governments and
political leaders, if there is a real grasp
of the emergency among the people, it
is hard to sense it. There is still argument between those who believe in invasion and those who believe in “bombers
only” and those who believe nothing can
be done; the Russians apparently have
been led to expect more from the West
than the West expected to do; here the
President is consuming his energies in
issues of local politics, the Congress is
making campaign speeches instead of
facing its problems of taxation, inflation
and man power; and all the while the
battle is passing from one critical stage
in another and every moment that effective action is delayed brings nearer
the moment when it will be too late. The
Russian spaces are vast: the Russian
armies have avoided encirclement, kept
themselves “in being” and kept on fighting. With a maximum of unity in plan and
vigor in action from Britain and America, Hitler’s hordes can still be stopped;
and the 1918 experience reminds us that
once stopped they, too, may disintegrate. But it cannot be done by talk and
argument and wasting time in trivialities
and general complacency; it can only be
done by grim action, founded on a sense
of the grim urgency of the hour.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July, 15, 1942
Maurice Hindus
Believes Russia Will
Make No Peace With
Hitler
Finds People Still Ready to Die
Before Yielding, and Determined to
Strip Foes of Power to War Again;
Soviet Resources on Increase
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, New York Tribune Inc.
KUYBYSHEV, Russia, July 13.
It is believed here that Adolf Hitler in
launching his new offensive is seeking
more than anything else to compel Russia
to listen to peace proposals. He is ready
to sacrifice several million men to achieve
such a result, for, it is said here, he must
have peace not only because he promised
it again and again to the German civilian
population and armies but because he
must consolidate his position in the west
before America hurls her full military might
against him.
These are the very reasons why, in
this writer's judgment, Russia will not heed
now, any more than she did last winter,
the least suggestion of a compromise with
Nazi Germany. I had an enlightening discussion on this subject with a group of local school teachers.
«For nearly a quarter of a century,»
said a woman about forty years of age,
who taught literature, «we have striven to
educate our people, especially the youth,
out of national and racial prejudices. The
Death Before Compromise
“But under the Soviets we strove to
eradicate the old racial and national antagonisms. Not one insulting word have
we said or permitted to be said about the
Germans, not even after Hitler came to
power and the German press, orators and
radio deluged us daily with the vilest abuse
imaginable.
As long as Hitler was content with calling names we didn’t mind. Now, when he
is seeking to exterminate us — because
we are Russians — we would rather die
than make a compromise with him.”
The other teachers heartily concurred
in this opinion.
As I listen to Russians, young and old, I
detect no word of defeatism, though there
is much grumbling because of the lack of
a second front in Europe.
“The loss of territory is never much in
Russian wars,” said a well known Russian
writer, “as long as our armies make it a
graveyard for enemy soldiers.”
“The Russians can endure anything
and everything,” said another. “I fought
in the civil war with a regiment which for
days had no bread but only mush made
of sunflower seeds, but the men fought on
until they won.”
Still another writer added: “Don’t forget
that last winter Hitler was all around Tula
and, unable to take it, by-passed it and
dashed for Moscow, only to be thrown
back with enormous losses.” These blithe
words have no meaning if Russia is not
possessed of formidable fighting resources. The present offensive is so mighty that
one cannot emphasize too often the nature of these resources. Germany has a
substantial numerical superiority in tanks
and planes, but the Russian war industry
is turning out more and better armaments
than a year ago. New plants are continually being started and others are in process
of construction throughout the deep rear.
Superior in Man Power
In man power Russia has a decided
superiority. The Soviet Union is not using
women except as anti-aircraft crews and
snipers, but several millions of them are
ready to fight if the need arise.
The agricultural outlook this year is encouraging despite the losses of valuable
lands. Farmers in the Kuybyshev region
have plowed 500,000 more acres this year
than a year ago. They will plow more when
the Volga River waters have receded. Siberia, one of the richest farm countries
in the world, has plowed 4,500,000 more
acres. Kazakstan and other territories likewise have put vast new acreages under
cultivation. There are millions of new vegetable gardens everywhere. The rains are
abundant and the prospect for good crops
is excellent.
The civilian population is kept on a rigid diet where fats are concerned, but the
herds of livestock on the state and collective farms are well preserved. Despite the
war, the increase in 1941 was impressive,
according to the latest available figures.
Cattle increased 8 per cent; sheep and
49
07.42
Germans, throughout our history, never
liked either the people or the intelligentsia.
Read Herzen and Dostoievsky if you
want to know how the Russians can
hate Germans. In 1914, at the outbreak
of the first world war, on the Kuznetsky
in Moscow German shops were set afire
and Germans were violently attacked, so
strong was the feeling against them».
50
goats nearly 13 per cent, and pigs a little
more than 2 per cent.
The plan to increase the livestock this
year is the most ambitious ever. The figures are: cattle, 26 per cent; pigs, 15 per
cent, and sheep and goats, 26 per cent.
Reports from several leading livestock regions for the first five months of this year
indicate an over-fulfillment of the plan, especially in sheep and goats.
Want Germany Disarmed
An editorial today in “Pravda,” the Communist party newspaper, after calling upon
the people to work harder and sacrifice
more, said significantly: “We have all the
means and all the conditions for an early
defeat of the enemy and the complete expulsion of the Hitlerite bands from our land.”
It is obvious that Russia is determined
to fight on until Germany is forever stripped
of the power ever again to launch a war —
this regardless of Germany’s future form
of government, whether extreme Rightist
or extreme Leftist.
The support which the German people
of all classes, including the peasants and
workers, are giving the Hitlerite military machine in the present war has taught Russia
a lesson that she has no intention of forgetting now or when the war is finished.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 17, 1942
Maurice Hindus Finds
Russians Developing
New Individualism
Reports Swift Development of
Sense of Privacy and Realization
That ‘Some Things in Life Are
Eternal,’ Regardless
of Collectivist State
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, New York Tribune Inc.
KUYBYSHEV, July 15.
The longer I stay here and the more
Russians I meet, the better I understand
the nature of changes which have taken
place here during the six years of my absence and the more I marvel at the speed
with which the new Russian personality
has crystallized.
Some years ago I wrote a book entitled “Humanity Uprooted.” Now, despite
the war, one could write a book entitled
The State Is Everything
Here the state is everything: educator,
employer and dispenser of good and ill will.
The only individual enterprises in Kuybyshev are represented by three izvozchiks
— cabmen — whose carriages and horses
are as dilapidated as themselves, and two
owners of primitive donkey carts which are
used to haul freight.
Three old persons who operate street
scales are banded together in a collective
under state control, as are the scattered
shoe-shiners. Everything else, including
charities, is under state or collectivized
control, as it is all over the country.
Because this control was imposed suddenly and ruthlessly, much anarchy and
wildness of personal behavior was manifested at one time. There was an almost
complete repudiation of past usage and of
personal longings, however intimate and
fundamental.
I recall a visit I made to the Department
of Agriculture in the city of Minsk. On the
bulletin board there was a letter from a
young man, a college graduate, who had
been sent to work in a village and who, after a few months there, wrote to his superior that he hated the village, that he was
lonely and heart-sore and that he wanted
to return to Minsk, especially because the
girl he loved was in the city. The letter was
posted to disgrace the young man publicly, and he was denounced as a coward
and a traitor.
Compare this with a story I just finished
reading in “Komsomolskaya Pravda,” the
spokesman for Russian youth. The very
title “Education and the Emotions” is significant. It is a story of a sailor on a mine
sweeper who frequently was lonely and
depressed because he was far from a girl
in a Siberian village.
The captain of the vessel learned of
the sailor’s troubles, talked cheeringly to
him and got an officer to give him lessons
in mathematics and languages, which
restored his happiness. The story is featured in the paper as a guide to other
commanders on boats, on land and in the
army.
Yesterday I met a man whom I knew
years ago in Moscow. He asked if I had
seen the play “Anna Karenina,” and, on
learning that I had not, he advised my going to it at the earliest opportunity.
“The audience will be a revelation to
you,” he said and added that in his youth
the young people laughed at Anna’s love
and her woes, convinced that under the
Soviet system such troubles were impossible.
51
07.42
“Humanity Rooted.” Formerly the Soviets,
after tearing up the old environment and
the old way of life and thought, gave the
people ideas, passions and blue-prints,
but hardly anything more. Now they are
offering the people, especially the generation between sixteen and nineteen years
old, soil in which to sink deep personal and
social roots.
Every day I encounter a host of incidents that illustrate this condition. Today,
for example, the press carries an announcement about the family of Eugene
Petrov, a writer known in the United States
as a co-author of the satire “The Little
Golden Calf.” Petrov was killed at Sevastopol. The state is to pay his funeral
expenses. In addition it is giving his wife
immediately 10,000 rubles and a monthly
pension of 500 rubies. It also will pay 300
rubles a month toward the support of his
two young sons until they are of age.
52
“I never realized what Innocent fools
we were,” he said, “until I saw the present
young generation at a performance of the
play. They wept and wept because they
realized that some things in life are eternal; that some sorrows, like some joys,
are with us forever, regardless of the state
of society in which we live. I cannot tell
you how much I envied them. I never realized before now wonderful it was to be
romantic. I wish I could relive my youth — I
missed so much.”
This hard-headed Bolshevik talked like
a character in a Turgenev novel.
The present young generation in
Russia most emphatically is romantic
and highly individualized in its intimate
life. Yet its romance is no undisciplined
emotional splurge. To this generation romance means, as a young pedagogue
explained, “sensible, stabilized living.” It
is associated with marriage and children,
as in the good old-fashioned times the
world over.
In the town of Peredelkino, outside
Moscow, there has been an authors’
colony for about eight years. A number of
the authors are now in Kuybyshev. Twenty of them and their families lived in their
own homes in Peredelkino, yet there was
not a single divorce or one family scandal
— quite a record for authors anywhere.
This is a result of the new sense of privacy and the new individualism which is
developing here side by side with collectivized ownership and control of “means
of production.”
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 17, 1942
Collective Farms of
Russia Playing Major
Role in War
200,000 Units Keep Army Well
Fed, Banish Famine, Absorb
Millions of Evacuees and
Provide Havens for Wounded
Soldiers
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, Hew York Tribune Inc.
RUSSKIYA LIPYAGI, Russia, July 17.
A visit to a village like this of some 200
families gives one a fresh appreciation of
the momentous part the collective farms are
playing in this war. Highly mechanized, highly
disciplined and embracing more than 99 per
cent of the peasant-worked lands and more
than 95 per cent of the rural population, they
give the Russian rear a stability and strength
it never could have had otherwise.
Thanks largely to the collectives, the
army is well fed, the civilian population,
especially in certain districts, though on
restricted food rations, is not facing famine, tens of millions of evacuees — the
Russians never use the word “refugees”
— somehow get absorbed into normal
pursuits and normal life, and no bands of
orphaned children roam the highways and
darken the horizons, as in the ‘20s.
Wherever I turn in the village of unpainted homes, grass-grown streets, surly
dogs and straggling goats, I observe evidence of an economic and national inte-
300,000 Kolkhozes Ready to Serve
Instantly the chairman found a home for
them and issued food cards to them. To an
old woman to whose house they went he
said: “Remember, auntie, these young men
are ready to give their lives to the motherland and for you and me, so heat up the
bath house, cook for them and be like a
mother to them.” When he left the house
he said: “We have twelve wounded soldiers
from the occupied territories; we will take
good care of them. We also have fifty women and children evacuees. All but one of
them work and manage to get along. They
are peasants and intellectuals. Their husbands are fighting, lost or dead. Their children are in a nursery with our own and get
three meals a day, including a pint of milk
and fifty grams (1,78 ounces) of sugar.”
This kolkhoz, though of 4,000 acres,
is neither one of the largest, nor the best
in the Kuybyshev region, yet it provides
a home for twelve wounded soldiers and
fifty women and children. With the German drive through the Don Valley it ex-
pects more. The reader can imagine the
part that more than 200,000 kolkhozes still
under Soviet rule can play in the care of
the homeless and wounded.
In a cart filled with freshly cut grass and
drawn by a sprightly dark stallion we drove
around the fields. Rye, wheat and other
crops grow here, with stalks tall, thick and
already eared out. With the sun on them
and the breeze over them they stretch to
the horizon like the rippling sea.
Children of Twelve Working
“This is one of the best crops we ever
had,” said the chairman, proudly eyeing
the immense fields.
We drove on as he talked in a slow
drawling voice like a boy a little abashed
before a stranger.
“Before the war we had 124 men working; now there are only fifteen, one of them
younger than fifty and some over seventy.
Yet we sowed 500 acres more of wheat
and 110 acres more of potatoes than last
year and many more acres of tomatoes,
too. We did it by working harder, with the
women and children showing unexpected
energy and skill.”
We drove by a potato field where
crowds of children were pulling up weeds
by hand. We stopped. The children eagerly crowded around, with hands black with
earth and cheeks like china, at the same
time obviously glad that the arrival of a
stranger diverted them, if only for a brief
period, from their work.
A man, clean-shaven, bespectacled and
with stooping shoulders, came over. He was
the teacher in charge of the children.
“Nichevo (never mind),” he said. “We
will supply the front and rear with plenty of
food, won’t we, children?”
53
07.42
gration which few American students of
Soviet Russia have imagined possible.
As the chairman of the kolkhoz —
collective — and I are on our way to the
fields, we approached two young men,
one of them tall, slowly dragging his feet
as though he were too feeble to walk, and
the other short, on crutches, with his right
foot and left hand heavily bandaged. They
were soldiers from the Leningrad front
who had just arrived. The families of both
were in the occupied area, and no news
had been received of them. The men were
wounded in action and had come out of
hospitals and sent to this kolkhoz for rest
and recuperation.
54
The children nodded and laughed and
shouted: “More than plenty.”
All children of twelve years of age and
over are working this summer. As we
drove off the children waved their hands
and bade us good by, while the chairman
resumed talking.
“We have made arrangements with a
deaf and dumb school in a city for an exchange service. They send students, boys
of fifteen and sixteen, to help repair machinery and saw lumber, while we in return
allot them land for a garden, a plow, harrow and furnish seed. They get food and
we get indispensable mechanical aid.”
“This is one way in which the kolkhozes the country over managed to solve the
labor problem. Then the cities help. Next
Sunday 100 volunteers are coming over to
gather and put away 500 tons of sunflower
ensilage and weed the millet fields.” Thus
far it is obvious that, despite the war, the
farms are in excellent condition.
I returned to the village to meet the director of the school, a woman of thirty-five,
short, portly, blonde, vivacious with blue
eyes and brimming over with energy.
“There is no shortage of food anywhere,” she said, “unless transport breaks
down. The teachers of this school are all
working to have gardens. Four have cows.
I just bought fifteen chickens and hope to
have my own eggs next winter. Would you
like to see the gardens?”
We strolled through the village. In the
rear of every house was a huge garden
of one-third to four-fifths of an acre, with
green and thick vegetables — potatoes,
onions,
carrots, beets and pumpkins,
which, eaten steamed all winter, provide
sugar and vitamins. The school’s own garden is worked by teachers and students,
so that they have vegetables in hot lunches during the winter.
“We have made arrangements,” said
the school director, “with an army post for
100 soldiers to give one day to cut wood
for the school. In return we work their vegetable garden.”
She, too, impresses on me a widespread tendency among the kolkhozes to
exchange services with other institutions.
Second Front Paramount
“It’s not the food we are worried about
but the second front,” she went on. “Think
of what is happening in the long valley of
the Don. Germany’s mechanical superiority is pushing us harder and harder, yet
there is no second front.”
The chairman and others who gather
around deluge me with questions as to
why the Allies are holding off when every day is precious. Some of the women
whose husbands already are at the front
or have been killed wiped their eyes and
murmur, brokenly: “If only a second front
could smash the enemy quickly and save
our fathers and sons.”
The Times, July 22, 1942
Resilient Mood
of Moscow
WORKERS’ EFFORTS
INTENSIFIED
HOPES FIXED
ON WEST
FROM OUR SPECIAL
CORRESPONDENT
MOSCOW, JULY 21
The grave news from the southern
front has had little apparent effect on the
surface mood of Muscovites, who are as
buoyant as ever. Their absorption in work
and leisure is perhaps a little deeper. Moscow is again a great capital, humming with
industry and administrative work, and, at
this season, offering many distractions.
These are fully grasped. The parks and
other places of recreation, so empty a year
ago, are crowded. By public demand the
theatre and concert seasons are running
on through the summer. The avidity of the
modern Russians for educational recreation is as keen as ever and lecturers, with
sadly inadequate material, are now busily
trying to show various aspects of Russia’s
allies at war.
The Muscovites’ leisure is well earned.
Most of Moscow’s factories have regarded
the Government’s programme as a challenge, and each month sees the plan overfulfilled and records beaten. This spirit of
emulation runs right through the factory.
Benches which consistently meet the demands of the programme are decorated
with little red banners, and the bonus system is widespread. Production committees
each month portion out the general plan
and inform each worker what and why his
efforts are necessary. Should he more
than fulfil expectations, he is treated in the
factory newspaper with little less respect
than the heroes at the front.
ANGLO-SOVIET TREATY
It is interesting to see from production
graphs how sensitive the workers are to
contemporary events. The announcement
of the Anglo-Soviet Treaty caused an immediate jump in production at Moscow’s
largest war factory. Though Russian workers appear very stolid, they are apparently
deeply impressionable at the bench. The
same is undoubtedly true of the army,
55
07.42
“Every day on waking,” said the school
director, “the first question I ask is whether
a second front has been started. When
I learn there is no second front my heart
sinks. We are all like that.” “Maybe,” remarked an older woman, “the Allies are
just fooling us and have no wish to start a
second front.”
I did my best to explain that the difficulties of opening a second front need elaborate preparation so there will be no failure.
The people listen politely but remain unconvinced. It is well that the British know of the
unhealthy suspicion growing in the villages
and even more markedly in the cities.
Yet presently the gloom is lifted by the
chairman of the local soviet (council). In
reply to a question as to the decline in the
birth rate, he confidently replies: “Nichevo,
We will more than catch up.”
Some one aids cheerfully: “No one can
beat Russia at this job.”
There is laughter and for a moment
they seen happy and triumphant.
56
whose fighting spirit has been greatly
strengthened by the news of the blows
struck against the enemy on other fronts.
The present operations, the serious
character of which should not be underestimated, are to be seen in close connexion
with developments elsewhere. The Germans are advancing, but only by drawing
their best forces in one direction; von Bock
is approaching, but western Europe is less
defended as a result. To make the best of
the new situation is the general resolve:
that is why there is burning impatience for
allied intervention in Europe; that is why,
should any such impression get round, a
single moment of unnecessary delay in intervention would cause a reaction to last
month’s high hopes which would be fatal
to Anglo-Soviet relations.
It is unquestioningly accepted here
that the second front will be opened just
as soon as the allies’ general staffs can
organize it, and any discussion in the
British Press about its desirability or any
judgments publicly expressed about the
most suitable time for it have the most
unhappy effect here. All that the Soviet
man now asks of the allies is that every
one in the west should work and train
resolutely and unquestioningly for the
second front with the same zeal that the
Russians work for their fronts. Praise is
irksome and sympathy distasteful. Russia wants the allies to look to their own
supreme interest, the defeat of Hitler, by
speedy intervention.
Such is the general trend of conversation of an evening in Moscow’s little parks,
redolent with the scent of tobacco plants,
among workers who are putting in a few
hours on allotments after a shift, among
the sturdy young woman chauffeurs standing round the bus termini, and among tired
and sunburned survivors of Sevastopol
who are now in Moscow.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 24, 1942
Maurice Hindus Says
Russians Evince No
Alarm at Nazi Gains
Finds People of Kuybyshev as
Certain of Victory as Peasants in
Villages, While Experts See Hitler
in Losing Race Against Time
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, Mew York Tribune Inc.
KUYBYSHEV, Russia. July 22.
While the Red Army’s newspaper “Red
Star” has proclaimed editorially that the situation is serious and the danger to Russia
great from the German drives, the man in
the street here is like the peasantry in the
villages from which I have just returned,
and evinces no hint of alarm or confusion.
The man in the street knows that Germany is straining every atom of human and mechanical energy to seize Rostov and Stalingrad and to fasten the Nazi hold on the Don
and Volga Rivers. He knows equally well the
stupendous energies and sacrifices required
to resist the evergrowing German avalanche, but he trusts to the fighting strength
of the Red Army and the holding strength in
the rear, regardless how much deeper both
may he obliged to retreat.
When the word “retreat” is mentioned,
it always is stressed that it will be a temporary state.
The Russian man in the street talks of
fighting to the last drop of blood, all alone
if necessary. Yet while many are disillusioned about a “second front,” foreigners
of Allied countries are not inclined to share
in this pessimism. They recognize that
Fuehrer Adolf Hitler is desperate to make
use of every hour of the summer weather
before he has to face the Allies in Western
Europe.
Conservative foreign opinion in Kuybyshev holds that in the winter campaign Germany lost 2,000,000 dead and 4,000,000
wounded, with half of the wounded now
back in service. It is estimated that Hitler
now has at the Russian front 5,500,000
men. Thus the Russian campaign has
compelled the withdrawal from Germany
of 9,500,000 Germans, which is over 10
per cent of the entire population.
Additional forces elsewhere substantially lift this already high percentage of
mobilized German man power. A conservative estimate is that there are only
750,000 German troops in France, and
in other European lands outside of Russia and in North Africa there are about
500,000 men. Others being trained in German centers would probably bring the total
to around 12,500,000 men in arms, or 14
per cent of the total population, which is
extravagantly high.
It is now past the middle of July. To
open a second front the Allies need a substantial spell of good flying weather, which
usually prevails only until September, or
within the next six weeks. Therefore, according to the above analysis, Hitler is
driving with all of his might to get some
decision on the Russian front on a gamble that no Allied army will meet his forces
within that nperiod, and there is no need to
divert any of the 5,500,000 troops fighting
in Russia.
Would Force Shift of Power
If Hitler has to fight on two fronts before
autumn, it may result in disaster, because
it would necessitate the shifting not only
of his man power from the one front to the
other, but from industry to the army. It is
unthinkable, some Russians believe, that
the Allies are failing to take advantage of
this opportunity, especially as the German
forces in the west are known to be greatly
thinned.
It is interesting and enlightening to see
here how the Russians have their eyes
and hearts fixed on their own land, their
own armies and their own powers. A middle-aged woman, who has three sons at
front showed me a freshly arrived copy of
“Red Star.” She pointed out a passage
she had marked with heavy red lines telling the story of a machine gunner named
Sidikov who was fighting in the Voronezh
sector.
The story told how Sidikov was gravely
wounded while successfully covering the
retreat of his own company. The Germans
surrounded him, but he, gathering all his
strength, hurled two anti-tank grenades
against the foe, killing twenty of them, and
with the third grenade tore himself and his
machine gun to pieces.
“It is all right,” said the woman. “We have
many Sidikovs”. We will survive and we’ll win.”
“Spirit of Voronezh”
Meanwhile, despite the German announcement ten days ago that Voronezh
had fallen, the enemy is still fighting there,
57
07.42
Drain on Hitler Army Seen
58
sacrificing masses of men and equipment
in an attempt to take the city. The Russians,
determined to hold on and fight back, already are saying: “The spirit of Sevastopol
and Leningrad is permeating both the army
and the civilians at Voronezh.”
Both sides were reported battling frenziedly, with no quarter given. “Pravda,” the
Communist party newspaper, said editorially
today “This is a fight not for life but for death.”
Admitting that the situation is grave,
“Pravda” assured its readers that Russia
has “all the means ... to stop the enemy
and to break up his attacking fury.”
The Russians are convinced that despite their setbacks they can eventually
bleed the Germans to exhaustion. The
battle for the Don is certain to be one of
the most sanguinary of this already most
sanguinary war.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 29, 1942
Maurice Hindus Says
Moscow Appears Festive and Colorful
Finds City Clean and People
Well Dressed Despite
Nearness of Nazis, but Says
Capital Seethes Inwardly With
Deep Thought and Emotion
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, New York Tribune Inc.
MOSCOW, July 25.
The German Army is only 100 miles
away from Moscow, but there is nothing in
the appearance of the city or the people to
remind you of it. The windows of the leading shops are boarded up and hung with
thick, black paper; the windows of homes
and offices are crisscrossed, sometimes
in fantastic shapes, with long strips of
white cloth; here and there from the top of
a building looms evidence in one form or
another of military vigilance. But otherwise
the city is supremely normal.
Indeed, outwardly Moscow is brighter
and lovelier than I have ever known it to be.
After Kuybyshev, one of the most shapeless an unkempt cities in the Soviet Union,
Moscow’s cleanliness is almost startling.
The main streets gleam with asphalt, and
even the side streets, whose cobbles billow up and down like the waves of a choppy stream, look scrubbed and washed.
No doubt Moscow streets are among the
cleanest of any city in the world.
Unlike Stalingrad, Baku and other cities I have visited, the Muscovite dress not
only on rest days or when they go to the
theater, but also for the street. This is especially true of office employees. As a result, unlike the last time I visited the Soviet
capital, the public here always appears as
if it were on parade and in a festive mood.
Much Color in Streets
That is why there is so much color in
the street — khaki, of course, but also red,
white, blue and green and now and then
a dab of yellow, and the shimmer of silk,
almost unknown six years ago, now is not
inconspicuous. Now and then some one is
seen sporting a hat which had not been
seen anywhere else.
Amazingly enough, there are many old
people around. Some are very old. There
are grandfathers ant grandmothers, who
which are almost taboo in America — onion
tops, for example, and sorrel and other leafy
grasses found growing wild in meadows.
There are many flowers in the market place,
and especially popular are cup-like bouquets
of wild cornflowers, daisies and red clover.
Thus, outwardly, Moscow looks more
decorative, more cultivated and more
grown-up than ever, and as much at peace
with the world as its rows of freshly grown
trees in the streets. But only outwardly.
Inwardly, as one quickly learns by talking
to the people, it seethes with thought and
emotions, the deepest it has ever known.
“Where are the German workers?”
some one asked.
“In Voronezh getting slaughtered with
the other Nazis.” said the servant girls in
the home of a friend. There is a world or
meaning in these caustic words, for Moscow, more than the rest of the country, has
been swept clean of its illusions about the
revolutionary spirit or ordinary human decency of any German group making up the
Reichswehr or the vast public loyally supporting the war.
“Little mother of mine!” said a highly
educated middle-aged woman whom I had
known for years. “What we went through
59
07.42
stand in line for papers, go shopping, play
with the children in the parks or just sit
on a bench and read a book or watch the
passing scene, and think and perhaps
dream.
In many other ways Moscow has lost
the aspect of undisciplined primitiveness
which long had brooded over the city. Not
even around the market place have I seen
any one strolling leisurely along the sidewalk, a lump of black bread in one hand, a
cucumber or a fat bunch of long onion tops
in another, eating from both. The people
just do not eat in the street any more.
Like the rest of the country, the capital
is completely chastened of beards. Mustaches, too, are disappearing. The only
one with a real mustache I have yet seen
here is Oscar Yonocitch, the Russian assistant of the Moscow bureau of the New
York Herald Tribune.
Beggars have become inconspicuous,
except on church steps on Sundays during
services. Nor is there any sign of drunkenness in the streets or in homes. Moscow,
as a matter of fact, is under prohibition there just isn’t much liquor to be had. The
potatoes and grains out of which vodka is
made are being conserved for food.
Nor is the Arbat market place the disorderly, slovenly gathering ground for peasants and city folk it once was. Though the
crowds are immense, they follow with soldier-like rectitude the regular lines of exit
and entrance.
The peasants, too, have learned a thing
or two about discipline or “culture,” as people in former days spoke of it. They wash
their vegetables before bringing them to
market, and the bunches of radishes, carrots, beets and onions make inviting patterns on the board counters.
The Russians eagerly eat many things
60
last October when the Germans were at
the outskirts of the city! It was infinitely
worse than anything our ancestors knew
when Napoleon was here, for Napoleon
only wanted to conquer us. The Germans
are bent on exterminating us.”
“The devil only knows,” said the woman’s husband, a distinguished engineer,
“what has happened to these people.
Again and again I am asking myself where
are those German mothers of whom the
German poets and novelists and dramatists have written with such an ecstacy of
love, and whom we, too, in our imagination anyway, had idealized? How can they
bring up such sons as German soldiers
now are?”
“For the first time in my life I was really frightened,” said the woman. “And
not of death — death is easy. You lie
down and pass away, and it is finished.
I was frightened of life — the things
which make up our Russian life — our
thoughts, our emotions, our tastes and
enjoyments, our friends, our books, our
pictures — everything.”
“She wanted to burn our books,” said
the husband and laughed, but not with
pleasure.
“Yes, I did. I gathered them in a sack
— Thomas Mann. Feuchtwanger, Gorki,
Chekov, Tolstoy and others, German
books, Russian books — I was down
carrying them to the furnace because I
dreaded the thought of their burning them.
“But I stopped her,” said the husband. “I almost had to drag her back to
the house. I put the books back on the
shelves again, and said, ‘These books
are sacred to you and me, our very souls
are in them, and only over our dead bodies will the German bandits take them
away from us.”
Couple Not Afraid of Worst
“And he embraced me,” said the woman. “And kissed me and said, ‘We will stay
right here darling, in our beloved Moscow,
and if they come we will face them together, each in each other’s arms — proud and
unafraid, leaning against the very books
we love and they hate — Russians to the
end, Muscovites to the last.
“Yes, that is what he said,” She sighed
and glanced tenderly at her white-haired
husband. “After that, no longer was I
afraid of anything — I was ready for everything. I cannot tell you how wonderful it
is not to be afraid of the worst, the very
worst. We are all like that, aren’t we, Boris
Nikolayevitch?”
“Aye, we are,” and with a sudden hardness in his voice he added, “I am not afraid
to die or to kill. Yes, to kill — wait and see
what is going to happen in the Don and
Volga fighting. We’ll kill plenty of them;
more than plenty. We hate enough to do
it, and we know how. Say it in your cables
to America. Don’t be afraid. Say it. Yes, kill
and kill and kill.”
Later, as I walked home in the dense
Moscow blackout, the man’s words rang
burningly in my ears.
The Times, July 29, 1942
A CRITICAL HOUR
The military situation of the United Nations is probably now graver than at any
time since the summer of 1940. Rostov
has fallen, and Hitler’s armies are methodically occupying the whole territory
enclosed by the bend in the Don. They are
the coal and iron deposits of the Ukraine
have to a large extent been made good.
But it is easier to move factories than
cornfields. The most fertile food-producing
districts are now nearly all lost. The harvest of the remainder can scarcely bring
Russia through the winter unaided. If the
most important oil-bearing areas pass
into German hands, and if the important
line of river communication up the Volga
is cut, the Russian transport system will
have suffered an almost irretrievable blow.
The Russian armies may and will remain
in being and continue the struggle. The
Soviet Government will stand unshaken
in its authority and in its determination to
resist. But Russian offensive power and
Russian capacity to engage and pin down
on Russian soil the bulk of Hitler’s military strength will, in that event, have been
lost to the United Nations without apparent
prospect of recovery.
Nor can any fair appreciation of the military danger to Russia, ignore the psychological consequences of a serious reverse
at this stage. In spite of a substantial flow
of material aid from Great Britain, Russia
is conscious of the fact that while the Ger-
61
07.42
striking rapidly across the river southward
towards the Caucasus, and are preparing
to strike eastward towards Stalingrad and
the Volga. The Russian forces have continued to resist with the utmost valour and
endurance. Their order and cohesion have
not been broken; and they are believed
still to have substantial reserves not yet
thrown into the battle. Their unshakable
hold on Voronezh and the counter-thrusts
undertaken from that strategic point are
undoubtedly part of a plan to threaten the
well-extended German communications
from the flank. But too little is known of dispositions and relative strengths to warrant
any easy-going optimism on this score.
The issue is vital not only for Russia, but
for the whole cause of the United Nations,
whose fortunes are as fully engaged in the
battle of the Don as in any struggle on any
part of their territories.
The delay in the beginning of this year’s
summer offensive against Russia has evidently robbed it of none of its intensity. Its
concentration, unlike that of 1941, on a
single sector of the front may be taken as
evidence not of diminished German striking power but of better-organized transport and better-laid plans. Hitler’s policy,
conforming to that of the German General
Staff of 1917, is to drive Russia out of the
war before America is effectively in it. The
whole massive energy of the German war
machine is at present directed to this single purpose. A race against time is in
progress, not merely between Germany
and Russia, but between Germany and
the whole strength of the United Nations.
Part of the German purpose has been already achieved. The Russians performed
prodigies of skill and endurance last year
when they carried vital war industries back
to the Urals; and the effects of the loss of
62
man invader has the assistance of numerous Finnish, Rumanian, Hungarian,
and Italian divisions — not to mention minor levies from other sources — the Russian armies stand alone on the European
continent in organized resistance to the
common enemy. The record of M. Molotov’s conversations in Washington and London inspired in Moscow the confident hope
that military action by British and American
forces in Europe was contemplated before the year was out. The fulfilment of this
hope necessarily depends on possibilities
on which no pronouncement can be made
without full knowledge of all the relevant
facts. Whatever the limits of the possible,
nothing less will suffice. “ We did not allow
considerations of our own safety to stand
in the way of supplying arms to Russia,”
said Mr. Lyttelton a week ago. The same
principle must guide British and American
policy in deciding what form of help can be
given to Russia in this critical hour.
If means can be found by the United Nations of bringing effective relief to the hardpressed Russian armies, they will be turning
to advantage the unique opportunity provided by the overwhelming concentration of
Nazi resources on the Eastern front. There
is no doubt about the national desire for a
“second front,” and it was welcomed some
weeks ago by Mr. Churchill himself as evidence of “the militant, aggressive spirit of
the British nation.” It is true there is more
than one front on which this spirit might find
its expression, and that — to take an example — a resounding victory over Rommel
would make a contribution to the cause of
Russia and of the United Nations scarcely
less heartening than the opening of a new
front. It is true that strategy cannot be conducted by mass meetings, and that public
discussion is incompatible with the framing
of any intelligent plan of campaign. It is true
also that the closest union of policy is imperative between London and Washington.
Nevertheless the men who, on the British
side, bear at this moment the responsibility
for a momentous decision are in the main
the men who have been responsible for the
supreme direction of the war over the past
two years. In the end the effectiveness or
ineffectiveness of the support given to Russia in her hour of peril will, quite inevitably,
be taken — and on the whole rightly taken
— as the acid test of the ability and foresight with which the conduct of the war has
been planned and developed.
The New York Herald Tribune,
July 29, 1942
Maurice Hindus Says
Russians React Grimly
to Fall of Rostov
Finds No Attempt to Minimize New
Reverses, Fiery Determination to
Defend Caucasus, Questioning
Attitude on Second Front
By Maurice Hindus
By Wireless to the Herald Tribune
Copyright, 1942, New York Tribune Inc.
MOSCOW, July 28.
The fall of Rostov is a serious blow
both militarily and to morale, and the
Russians are not inclined to underestimate its effects. On every hand one
hears Muscovites saying: «Our suffering brothers and sisters in Rostov must
endure for the second time the German
inquisition.»
oath, not only for organized army units but
also for individual soldiers.
“Fight to Last Drop of Blood”
In a special appeal to the soldiers, “Izvestia” said today: “Fight to the last drop
of blood. Kill the German, Kill him with bullets. When your bullets are gone, blow him
up with grenades.” When the grenades are
gone, pierce him with your bayonet, and
when your bayonet is broken, knock him
over the head. When you have nothing
with which to strike him, seize him by the
throat and choke him.”
One must be here to appreciate the
flaming hate for the Germans and the tempestuous resolve to fight them with every
weapon available.
Adolf Hitler is pouring ever-swelling
63
07.42
«Red Star,» the Army organ, headlined
the report of the Russian withdrawal from
Rostov with the telling
phrase: «North
Caucasus Threatened.» The North Caucasus is one of the richest and most beloved parts of Soviet Russia. Although it is
only about the size of Missouri, it accounts
for one-third of the nation's oil, one-third of
its sine and one-fifth of its lead, and it contains some of its finest wheat lands, which
are now being harvested, and also its finest health and summer resorts.
It Is obvious that the Don, all the way
from Voronezh to Rostov, is becoming the
scene of one of the greatest battles in history. According to «Izvestia,» the government newspaper, it is the greatest battle in
history, with the Russians making a stand
under the slogan, «Die, but do not retreat,»
a slogan that is assuming the power of an
64
waves of tanks, planes, guns and men
into the southern front. The silent Don,
with its limitless, luxurious and almost
snow-white beaches, especially in the
Tsimlyansk region — beaches that remind the visitor of the times of peace and
plenty — is becoming the graveyard for
more men than that of many a historic
battlefield. It is the only large-scale graveyard of this war where Russians and Germans lie side by side.
At Rostov the overwhelming superiority of the Germans, especially in tanks and
planes, is driving the Russians back. “The
struggle is becoming increasingly difficult,”
commented “Red Star.”
It was believed that Rostov could hold
out a long time, to become a second Sev-
astopol, but the fortifications the Russians
built during the eight months since they retook the city from the Germans did not protect the Russian Army’s flanks, and Marshal Semyon Timoshenko is not repeating
the error committed by Marshal Semyon
Budenny at Kiev. Instead he is saving his
army at the expense of the city. The German losses are enormous, but they are
pressing forward with unabated energy
and wildness.
Bridgeheads Destroyed
At Tsimlyansk the German efforts to
throw large forces across the Don have
had little success. The Russians seem to
have achieved the massing and co-ordination of tanks, artillery, trench mortars
and infantry, which are playing havoc with
German pontoons. Scores of these and
of heavy bridges, loaded with men and
equipment, have been blasted by artillery
shells.
Here and there Russian steel pincers
are crushing enemy forces that managed a landing. At only one place have
the Germans succeeded in bringing over
to the southern bank of the Don a large
force, and the Russians are attempting to
destroy it. The Germans are fighting hard
to remain there and fortify their position so
that they can maintain a springboard on
the highly coveted southern bank.
According to “Pravda,” the Communist party organ, the Germans are rushing
fresh divisions from France and Holland
to the Don front. The identifying numbers
of these divisions have been known for
several days by correspondents, who obtained them unofficially, but to-day “Pravda” identifies them in a front-page editorial
as the 24th and 25th Tank Divisions and
New Misgivings Arise
Yesterday “Pravda” published the radio address made by Cordell Hull, American Secretary of State. Hull ignored the
question that is of most pressing concern to the Russians. He held forth no
prospect of the immediate fulfillment of
their most cherished expectation, a second front. But he committed America
once more to fighting the enemy anywhere and everywhere he can be found
and until complete victory is won. In so
doing he helped to allay suspicion of the
Allies and sustain the lingering faith in
the Allies, especially in the British military agreement negotiated by Foreign
Commissar Viacheslav M. Molotov. Today’s news of the fall of Rostov, of more
German slaughter, of refugees fleeing
from the city and of the arrival of fresh
German divisions from France and Holland are rousing once more the worst of
misgivings. But the Russian determination to fight on is not weakened in the
least by the Rostov setback.
The Times, July 30, 1942
“German Strategy
Will Fail”
POLISH FAITH IN RUSSIA
In a broadcast yesterday on the occasion of the first anniversary of the signing
of the Polish-Soviet Treaty, General Sikorski, Polish Prime Minister and Commander-in-Chief, said: —
The agreement with Soviet Russia not
only restored a large number of Polish
citizens to freedom but also enabled tens
of thousands among them to take up the
armed struggle with the barbarous Germans, whom our nation hates so much.
I hope that in the near future the number
of these soldiers will increase. As we so
much desired, this agreement was to open
a new era between Poland and Russia. It
was based on the recognition of the principle that strong Poland is a necessity for a
lasting balance of power in Europe. Moreover, the statement that the Germans are
our irreconcilable enemies, with whom we
shall have to carry on an inexorable fight
until the victorious conclusion, is one of the
chief pillars of mutual understanding. The
Polish Government will remain faithful to
these principles. The application of them
will guarantee a better future to the nations
living in Central-Eastern Europe.
We are faced to-day with the hated enemy’s desperate efforts on all fronts, for he
would like to achieve a decision this year.
Though paying with enormous losses in
men and materials, he has achieved substantial successes. Yet he has not paralysed the Soviet Command, nor has he
broken the spirit of the Russian soldiers.
German strategy, which aims at destroy-
65
07.42
the 71st, 72d, 305th, 336th, 220th, 270th,
271st and 77th Infantry Division.
“Pravda” speaks of other units which
have been shifted from the west to the
east, but gives no additional divisional
numbers. There is a purpose in the newspaper’s disclosure: it is to announce to the
Russian people and to all the world that
because of idleness on the western front
the Germans are able to throw many fresh
divisions into the Don steppes.
66
ing and shattering the Soviet Army before
Anglo-Saxon might can arise in the West
ready for a decisive battle, will meet with
failure.
The leaders of the allied Powers
are not forgetting the second front – of
which I have been and still am an advocate – and they understand that it is
indispensable to the allies that this front
should be created in conditions giving a
guarantee of success. However, realistic
considerations alone must decide about
this, even at a moment when the German Army is gradually mastering areas
of great importance for further operations. Of great importance indeed, but
not decisive.
We know that the result of this terrible
war will be decided finally by the united efforts of the allied nations.
08.42
08.42
69
Chicago Daily Tribune,
August 13, 1942
RUSSIA’S CHANCES.
The war news from Russia is far from
bright, but it is far less hopeless than a
great many people are inclined to think.
Since Sevastopol fell July 1 and the Nazi
hordes opened their great drive on the
Caucasus, the Russians have been able
to report little but a dogged resistance and
a steady retreat. The Germans have now
reached the foothills of the Caucasus on
the eastern shore of the Black sea, imperiling the two remaining bases of the Russian Black sea fleet. They are driving laterally across the northern Caucasus toward
the Caspian in the attempt to pinch off
communications to the north. And they are
fighting at the approaches to the industrial
city of Stalingrad farther north in the Don
river bend.
The gains have been great and they are
threatening. The north Caucasus was second only to the German occupied Ukraine
as the source of Russian food supply. In
the Caucasus is 75 to 85 per cent of Russia’s oil supply. Already the Russians have
been compelled to apply the scorched
earth policy to the Maikop fields, which
represent 7 per cent of Russian oil. The
great prize, however, lies in the oil fields
of Baku and the pipelines south of the
mountains, and while those are not yet in
Hitler’s grasp, the Russian supply problem
will become infinitely greater if the oil must
be moved across or around the Caspian to
reach the Red forces in the north.
Despite this foreboding picture, our
ambassador in Moscow, Adm. William H.
Standley, states that Russia has no intention of quitting and that its future prospects
cannot be written off as altogether dark.
The Red army, he reports, is intact, and
the soviet government believes that it will
remain intact. Even if it is driven further
back, it can stand on the line of the Volga,
the broadest natural obstacle the Nazis
have yet encountered, with a good hope
of maintaining that position.
The development of the campaign so
far suggests that Hitler has abandoned
his tactics of last summer, when he attempted to make general advances on a
line stretching almost 2,000 miles from the
Black sea to the While sea, and has concentrated almost his entire mechanized
might and a great part of his air force in
the southern drive. Marshal Timoshenko’s
southern army has had to bear the entire
brunt of this terrific thrust, and, considering
the weight thrown against it, has not fared
too badly in the last month and a half.
The great danger is, not that Timoshenko’s army will disintegrate, but that it will
be fragmented, with one force left in the
Don and Volga area, and another cut off
from it attempting to hold the Caucasus
70
mountains. The Nazis are reported to be
assembling special tank and mountaineer
troops to break the mountain defenses,
but this line has great natural strength and
may easily be held if the Russian forces
are well equipped and numerous. The
Caucasus defenders, even if isolated from
the remainder of Timoshenko’s force, can
be supplied from America thru the route to
the Persian gulf and across Iran which has
been in use for many months.
The German position at present is awkward. There is a great bulge thrust out toward Stalin­grad, with a long exposed flank,
and a thin finger lower down thrust toward
the Caspian. If Timoshenko can marshal
men and equipment for heavy counterattacks, he may still be able to cause Hitler
great embarrassment.
But, in any event, the Germans, no
matter how great their successes in the
south, cannot hope to convert them into
the smashing decision that is necessary
to knock Russia from the field. The Russian army must be destroyed before Hitler
can claim victory. So far that objective is
no­where near attainment. Timoshenko’s
army still stands.
And to the north of Timoshenko, Budenny’s army of the center, grouped in a
great protective arc before Moscow, and
Voroshilov’s army of Leningrad and the
north are still in the fight, with their offensive potential a question mark that must
continually disturb Hitler. Before the Nazis can consider Russian resistance as
broken all these armies must be driven
from the field. Hitler himself, when he
undertook this year’s offensive, apparently did not consider that as a possible
attainment this year. At the end of last
winter he pledged that his forces would
be better prepared for the coming winter.
The evidence suggests that Germany
may not obtain a conclusive victory in
Russia this year. For almost 14 months
Russia has withstood a pressure terrible to contemplate, but it has with­stood
it and is still withstanding it. Whatever
the immediate possibility of a European
second front, the Russians must know
that American and British strength will
reach full proportions in 194З, as both
our army leaders and Prime Min­ister
Churchill have said for the record many
times. Meanwhile, we shall undoubtedly
redouble our efforts to supply the Russian armies, and the time is not too far
away when darkness and weather will
help protect our convoys on the northern
route to Murmansk.
If Russian courage, which has for so
long proved itself, is adequate to the continuing strain of a remorseless test, the
Russians can know that forces as mighty
as those that are grinding them now will
fall upon their enemy and save Russia and
all who stand beside her in danger.
Soviet Artillery
Strength
ARMY WAITING
IN THE MOUNTAINS
REALISTIC TACTICS
From Our Special Correspondent
MOSCOW, Aug. 16
The week-end reports do not indicate
any significant changes on the fronts,
where fighting continues round the same
main sectors which have been mentioned
during the past three days. As reinforcements move up to Bock's advanced positions, the battle-front is broadening, but
dispatches suggest that where the terrain
favours the defence the Russians are in
sufficient strength, particularly artillery
strength, to hold the enemy.
The Caucasian Army has not been led
into the trap of trying to fight tank warfare
without tanks; and, fearful as has been
the price in rich Kuban soil and flourishing farming communities that their realism
has cost, it is nothing compared with the
total destruction of armies that might have
happened on the southern steppes. As it
is, the Caucasian armies in the field are
powerful enough to be resisting strongly
in Circassia, and especially on the Kuban
River at Krasnodar.
Behind this fighting army waits another
on the mountain borders of Transcaucasia,
an army of mountain folk who are trained
in Alpine warfare. One is reminded to-day
more strongly than ever before of Falkenhayn's criticism of the eastern campaign of
Hindenburg and Ludendorff, that, however
deeply a hostile army penetrates into Russia, it profits little unless the military power
of the Russians is destroyed.
VIBRANT APPEALS
The tone of the Russian Press remains
confident, and it is clear that the Red Army
is responding to the vibrant appeals to
its patriotism which were made when the
threats to the Volga and the Caucasus first
developed. The iron will of the Russian
gunners holding positions in the hills of the
Volga basin below Stalingrad against the
assault of huge tank forces, the persistence and ingenuity of the defence in the
crook of the Don elbow, and the offensive
spirit that has been so well rewarded on
the broad Voronezh front have shown that
the heart of Russia is as sound as ever.
An individual, but significant, example
of to-day's spirit is a letter of which a copy
was shown me yesterday. It was written
by members of a Red Army detachment
to the parents of a fellow-soldier who had
surrendered to the enemy. «We hope you
are as much ashamed of your cowardly
son as we are,» the letter ran; and it may
be capped by another letter, which has
been circulated to all men in an artillery
regiment, written by a goldminer in Siberia, who is 50 years old, to his soldier son,
in which the father says that he could not
bear to think of the Germans advancing in
the south and had volunteered, asking to
be sent there to help check the enemy.
VORONEZH ADVANCE
This pugnacious determination is firing
the Russians in their continued advance
across the Don and near Voronezh. Although the Wehrmacht is striving desper-
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08.42
The Times, August 17, 1942
72
ately to stabilize the situation and to regain
the lines of strategic importance which it
achieved at great cost in July, the Russian
successes continue. Reports of the operations of the past 48 hours indicate the
failure of all enemy counterattacks and the
capture of further heights by the Russians.
Soviet reports are prudent about this front
and lay stress on the enemy's determination to recover losses; but there is an underlying note of confidence, stronger than
at any time since the Voronezh front was
opened last month.
The situation before Stalingrad is somewhat obscured by reports which, probably
because of the time lag, do not always tally. Some indicate a lull on the Kotelnikovo
sector, with the Germans keeping up pressure only on narrow sectors in the main
directions; other reports speak of fighting
with undiminished intensity for the control
of heights.
The position west and north-west of
Stalingrad also is not clear. Recent com-
muniqués no longer mention operations
“in the KIetskaya region” but “in the area
south-east of Kletskaya,” but one report
to-day states that Russian strength is increasing is the region of the town. The
presence of an enemy force near the Don
banks must, however, be reckoned with,
though in general attempts to punch gaps
through the defenders of this hilly country
are failing.
The Times, August 18, 1942
New Epoch in World
Affairs
MOSCOW’S VERDICT
From Our Special Correspondent
MOSCOW, Aug. 17
Though Mr. Churchill’s presence in
Moscow was kept an official secret, there
had been during the past week a general
sense in the air that something momentous was afoot. On Wednesday afternoon
three Liberator bombers were seen over
Moscow, and there was a movement
through the streets of exceptionally smart
infantry and Cossacks in parade uniform.
A little glimpse of Mr. Churchill was obtained as a limousine drove swiftly down
Gorky Street on the way to the Kremlin.
The same evening Mr. Harriman informed
the American Press representatives that
already the leaders of Great Britain and
Russia were in conference.
The negotiations, as the announcement later declared, were carried on “in
an atmosphere of cordiality and complete
sincerity”; in the Russian text, the word
translated negotiations is “peregovory,”
weeks passed without an invasion of western Europe, and gave place to doubts,
suspicion, and even anger. But faith in the
sincerity of Mr. Churchill and President
Roosevelt is constant, and the pugnacious
spirit of the British and American peoples
is widely known.
The presence of Britain’s war planners
in Moscow will do much to restore complete confidence, for it will be interpreted
as a sign that Great Britain’s intervention
in Europe lies not far ahead.
M. Molotov, one of the principal architects in the arduous tasks of building the
allied victory, was to-day named First VicePresident of the Council of People’s Commissars. This gives him a position equivalent to that of Deputy Prime Minister.
The Times, August 22, 1942
Volga and Caucasus
The war-clouds seem to be banking
thicker than ever; and the air is heavy with
the electricity which heralds new storms.
In the Pacific the first action dictated by
allied initiative since the moment when
Japan entered the war is in progress,
and the auguries appear favourable. The
combined operation at Dieppe may have
been no more than an experiment, but an
experiment on a very large scale, providing many valuable lessons which are even
now being digested. It has also given the
Germans cause for reflection, and this is
already rather less jubilant than it was immediately after the re-embarcation of our
forces. It may be divined that the first relief
at the discovery that the landing-force was
only a gigantic raiding party has given way
73
08.42
the meaning of which lies somewhere between negotiations and conversations. A
“talking over” would be a fair translation in
undiplomatic language, and that best describes what occurred.
The distinguished personages who did
this “talking over” – and who ended by
being as convinced as ever of the determination of each other’s Government to
pursue the war with the utmost strength –
accurately gauged public opinion here by
saying as little as possible; for deeds, not
words, are what the Russians want. In any
case it is not the custom of military leaders to publish details of their joint plans for
conducting campaigns.
There are two aspects to the Moscow
talks: the event and the consequences.
The fact that Great Britain’s Prime Minister
and war leader, accompanied by the Chief
of the Imperial Staff and other experts
drawn from the heat of battle should have
travelled 10,000 miles to consult, in the
presence of President Roosevelt’s representative, with the chief organizers of the
defence of Russia will capture the world’s
imagination now and hearten every fighting man in the allied forces; but it is on the
results that the meeting will eventually be
judged.
It may be confidently said that the results will mark the opening of a new epoch
in world affairs. Among British participants
at least there has been a mood of great
optimism and excitement which leaves no
doubt of the success of the conference.
Some two months ago the Russians
enthusiastically welcomed the signing of
the Anglo-Soviet Treaty and the London
and Washington announcements. It was
the references to a second front in 1942
which thrilled them more than anything
else then. Enthusiasm began to flag as the
74
to considerations of what the result might
have been had ten or twenty times the
strength been employed. “The significance
of this war has grown with its dimensions,”
writes GOEBBELS, some of whose recent
pronouncements have not been lacking in
realism; and again: “The German people
faces the dilemma – either to fight or to
abdicate.” In Egypt both sides have been
reinforced and both sides are sharpening
their weapons. The most suitable campaigning season is approaching, and the
probabilities are that long before it is over
the issue will have been decided.
But what is happening or may happen
elsewhere cannot conceal the fact that the
main theatre of the war is Russia; nor can it
be doubted that this is likely to be the case
for some time to come. It is in Russia that
events count most and will most deeply affect the future progress, and even the final
result, of the war. There the great bulk of
the German combatant strength and material resources are fully engaged; there
Germany is seeking the decision which
she hopes will bring in its train still wider
decisions. And it is more than ever clear
that the first and immediate decision is be-
ing sought in the offensive against the line
of the lower Volga. Reinforcements have
been brought up into the shambles of the
Don elbow, where the enemy, rebuffed
again and again in a long and almost static
struggle, is now making a supreme effort
to reach Stalingrad. He seems to have
cleared the greater part of the territory
within the bend. He has at last forced a
passage of the river, and though the Russians report that the majority of his troops
on the left bank have been destroyed and
that the mopping up of the remainder is in
process, it is not clear that this bridgehead
has ceased to exist. While there remains to
him the slightest foothold beyond the Don
there is deadly danger, and even if this is
removed he will without doubt continue to
thrust for weak points all along the wide
eastern arc of the Don. The turning movement south of the bend has made very little progress in face of stout resistance and
determined counterattacks, but it cannot
be said that the peril here has diminished.
In the Caucasus the campaign has
taken the course that might have been
expected. The enemy is making progress,
but only by the easiest avenues, and so
slowly that – except in the region of Krasnodar – there have been no alterations to
make on a small-scale map for several
days past. The most serious threat in this
quarter is that to Novorossiisk and, indeed, to the whole Black Sea coastline in
its neighbourhood. Two processes have
been simultaneously at work: a hardening of Russian opposition on ground more
favourable to defence; and an exhaustion,
distension, and absorption of the German
fighting strength. The result has been one
of those relative pauses – relative but
significant and unmistakable – which occurred on some half a dozen occasions
moment by every means which resource
can devise. Such is the counsel not only of
gratitude but also of common prudence.
Daily Boston Globe,
August 23, 1942
If Russia Loses, Whole
Middle East May Fall to
Hitler, Stowe Warns
By LELAND STOWE
(Copyright. 1942. by the Boston Globe
and Chicago Daily News)
MOSCOW. Aug. 22 (CDN)
The situation along the great Don bend
and across the Don, above Kotelnikovo,
where the Nazis’ armored divisions are
hammering unrelaxed fury in an effort to
break through to the great strategic city
of Stalingrad, is as serious as words can
possibly portray. The Nazi threat to the big
oil center of Grozny in North Caucasus is
equally grave.
This is why it will take a great deal more
than one Dieppe raid to convince the Russians the British and Americans are doing
everything possible to relieve the pressure
of the Nazi armies here. At the very least
there must be many and frequent landing
parties on the European coast. There
must also be more, much more regular
1000-plane raids over Germany. To have
any effect here, even as uplift to the Russians’ morale and relief to their feeling of
aloneness, these, Anglo-American raids
cannot be postponed until October or November. They must be staged at once and
with unprecedented force.
The British and American publics will
75
08.42
during the campaigns of 1941. How long
this will endure it is not easy to estimate;
it certainly will not do to count upon an inability of the German staff work and supply
system to accelerate the advance within
another week or ten days. But so far the
enemy has made no serious penetration of
the mountains, which are not an absolutely
impregnable fortress but are, nevertheless,
one of the most formidable military obstacles in Europe. It must not be forgotten,
however, that complete possession of the
vast isthmus between the Black Sea and
the Caspian would create a situation which
the Germans might be able to exploit in
more than one direction.
There are no definite reports of events
of major importance elsewhere, though the
Germans speak of a new offensive starting
at Orel. Taking the broadest view, it must
be said that the danger is as great as ever,
but that the Germans have never yet found
the opportunity to deliver a knock-out blow.
Russia has been grievously weakened, but
she fights on. She continues the combat
unshaken and defies the rules of obvious
military logic. Yesterday, for example, Leningrad celebrated the anniversary of the
opening of its siege. More than once the
Germans proclaimed its imminent doom,
which they would certainly not have done
unless they had believed what they said.
Leningrad is still fighting, and at this moment actually attacking. After losses and
batterings such as no other nation in the
world could have survived Russia still remains Germany’s principal immediate enemy. But the allied nations cannot count
upon Russian resistance enduring for ever
without increasing exterior support. Russia
is the main front, and the main problem is
to ensure that the growing allied strength is
brought to her aid at the earliest possible
76
be fatally misinformed unless they are told
that the war can be lost — or at the very
least prolonged by three or four years — if
Hitler is permitted to gain his lower Volga
and North Caucasus objectives in the next
month or two. There is nothing “secondary” about these South Russian battles. If
the Nazis seize Stalingrad and Baku the
chances of the Allies holding Iran, Iraq,
Syria, Palestine, India and Egypt will be
alarmingly small. Without this absolutely
essential and incomparably important middle area of the vast world battlefield where
and how and when can the British and
American Armies hope to defeat Hitler’s
legions?
For many months to come, and perhaps for the duration of the war, the attitude of the largest, most powerful army
on the Allies’ side — the Soviet Army —
and of 130,000,000 Russians toward their
British and American war partners will be
decided by what Anglo-American land, air
and sea forces do in Western Europe now.
If the Russians get completely fed up
with us, then Britain and the United States
may have to figure out how they can carry
nine-tenths of the burden of defeating Nazi
Germany on European soil.
What this means if very simple. In order
to crush Hitler and his terribly efficient military machine, Britain and America must
first win the wholehearted support of Soviet Russia, its huge army and its people.
We can only win that kind of support by
using every weapon we have got now, in
these next few but decisive weeks, to ease
and embarrass the Nazis’ blows in South
Russia.
As of today there is probably not a single Russian adult who thinks that either
Britain or America has begun to use every
weapon it has got.
09.42
09.42
79
The Times, September 1, 1942
The German Design
Germany is bracing herself mightily
for the fourth year of war. All reports, both
from private and from German sources,
show unmistakably that the regime is carrying through a new and even more ruthless mobilization of the nation’s reserves
of material and moral strength and, not
least, of ideas and ingenuity. It would be
folly to interpret the reports as implying or
revealing a dangerous strain on German
resources. Strain there is for all to see, but
there is no reason to suppose that German
resources cannot be adjusted to the new
pattern of the German campaign. Certainly Hitler’s war has not gone according to
plan. The Wehrmacht in all its branches –
military, aerial, and naval – was equipped
for decisive action in 1939 and 1940, but
not for decisive action in 1941, when Hitler
involved his forces in the gigantic conflict
with Russia. June 22, 1941, was a turning-point if ever there was one in history.
Then, Hitler miscalculated his own armed
strength and – fortunately for the cause of
the United Nations – that of Russia, too.
What 1941 proved, however, was not that
the German effort was exhausted but that
it had been unequal to its immediate task.
The pattern of the war in 1942 and 1943
was changed. It is still unfolding, but already it is seen to aim at the immobilizing
or “neutralizing” of Russian military and industrial power rather than at compassing
its utter destruction, which was the baffled
intention of Hitler’s 1941 campaign.
Our Diplomatic Correspondent reported on Friday that a significant change has
recently taken place in the character of
German war production. The production
of heavy armaments – tanks, big guns,
and, temporarily at least, even of aeroplanes – has declined and more labour is
being concentrated on the construction of
U-boats, locomotives, and what may be
described as the lighter weapons of modem warfare. The change though open
to several explanations can certainly be
regarded as a further foreshadowing of
the tasks which Hitler and his agents and
advisers have marked out for 1943. The
change in production is the essential complement to other changes. On the home
front there has been a wide extension of
the authority and strength of Himmler’s
S.S. and Gestapo; and this must be read
in conjunction with the appointment of a
new so-called Minister of Justice, who is
to proceed on Hitler’s maxim that the State
is above the law. If there be critics or opponents of the regime, steps are being
taken betimes to suppress them. The axe
or the concentration camp is the penalty of
a sinking faith or a too forcefully expressed
disillusionment over a war that has clearly
gone wrong. On the industrial front new
men are being introduced and new meth-
80
ods applied, and Goring’s newspaper, the
National Zeitung of Essen, is boasting that
“a new stage has been reached in the
development of the German armament
industry.” The change now being made
shows there is something in the boast.
The new mobilization embraces the
occupied and satellite lands equally with
the Reich. Europe is to be ransacked from
end to end for scrap; and Germans are
claiming that by the end of the year the
number of foreigners on war work in the
Reich will have risen to 3,000,000. The occupied lands are, in effect, being left with
little more than their eyes to weep with. An
American authority has estimated that the
annual tribute which Germany draws from
them is alone nine times as great as the
annual amount which she was required to
pay – and, it is pertinent to recall, found it
impossible to pay – as reparations under
the Young Plan. That is the measure of the
looted resources with which Germany is
now feeding her war machine. She needs
the wealth, skilled labour, transport, and
food of Europe not because of her own
extremity and exhaustion – she is far from
that – but because the changed pattern of
the war calls for still greater endeavours
and different enterprises. Such is the main
meaning of recent signs from the Reich.
The Germans are, in fact, planning for
1943. They have always used time better
than the United Nations. They have acted
on Nelson’s saying that five minutes may
make the difference between a victory and
a defeat.
The next weeks will show how near to
success Hitler is likely to come in his grandiose and audacious, though now limited,
aim of “neutralizing” Russia for the rest of
the war. Stalingrad, where the Germans
were thrown back in 1918 when thrusting
towards the Volga and the Urals, may yet
bring fresh glory to the lion-hearted leader
after whom the town is named. Its present
peril is clear enough, and so is its opportunity. The issue remains to be decided,
but already it may be said that Stalingrad
ranks with the memorable episodes of the
Russian campaign and may prove as crucial as the stand before Moscow did last
year. What, if his best hopes were realized, Hitler would do with his success is
a speculation rather than a certainty. The
change in German industrial production
may be a pointer. So, too, may be the attention the Germans are now devoting to
their defences in western Europe. Strategy
and production go hand in hand, as the
Germans have always well understood,
and as we have understood perhaps less
well and not always. It may be that Hitler
has lost the war, but he has yet to be defeated. To that task British and American
production must be directed with unsleeping awareness of the changing pattern of
the war. The mass of the joint production
of the United Nations is greater than anything the Germans can hope to achieve
even with their droves of industrial slaves
Daily Boston Globe,
September 4, 1942
Army of Soviet Workers
Toils Selflessly
to Speed Victory
Exclusive!
By LELAND STOWE
Special Radio
Copyright. 1942. by the Boston Globe
and Chicago Daily News. Inc.)
MOSCOW, Sept. 3 (CDN)
There is one tremendous Army in the
Soviet Union which you very rarely hear
about or read about, yet in fortitude, devotion and self-sacrificing patriotism it equals
the performance and spirit of Russia’s ever-fighting armed forces. This is the army
of workers, plain men and women, who
long ago abandoned the eight-hour day
and for more than a year have been laboring at a much severer tempo for 11, 12 or
in many cases, 14 hours a day.
They fight the virtually unreported war
and theirs is the role of unsung heroes
and heroines along the Volga, above the
borders of Afghanistan and India, deep in
central Siberia, and beyond. Millions and
millions of Soviet workers toil for victory
and among them are nobody knows how
many hundreds of thousands of women
whose husbands are at the front.
These Socialist workers have given up
labor’s most cherished right, the seven-
or eight-hour day. For the sake of arming
their country and for the ultimate defeat of
Hitlerism, they perform prodigies of endurance while still living on the plainest diet in
which meat has been reduced to the absolute minimum of an occasional luxury.
These Russian men and women work
much longer than American workers. Vast
numbers of them are filling output quotas
which are two, three, or four times their already very high pre-war quotas, yet their
food and compensation represents only a
fraction of what British and American industrial employees take for granted.
It seems almost certain that there are
no laborers in any of the Allied countries
who are sacrificing so much and giving so
much to their country’s war effort.
From time to time the Moscow newspapers publish items about production in
this oil refinery or in that tank factory or
arms plant. Over a period of months these
factual reports would assume the most imposing proportions but most of these separate items are snowed under by the day’s
military developments and never reported
to the outside world.
Nevertheless, one of the proudest
chapters in the story of the Soviet Union’s
amazing war effort belongs to the Russian
workmen and it must be recorded that they
have set an example to workers everywhere in the world.
Thousands of illustrations could be
given to show the gigantic contribution of
Russia’s workers to the fight against Nazi
Germany, but a few facts about the miners of the Moscow coal basin are a typical
example of what is going on, month after
month, from the Volga to Siberia’s Lake
Baikal and beyond that. In June 4 one
pit in the Moscow coal basin filled its six
months’ production quota and on July 27
81
09.42
and stolen resources. But the right means
have yet to be found of mobilizing this
mass for the achievement of victory.
82
this pit completed its output scheduled for
Sept 1 — 35 days of excess production in
less than seven months.
In the Moscow basin the average output of coal has been raised to 220 percent
in comparison to its pre-war production.
But this tremendous increase has not
been due to a big increase in the number
of employees or to new machinery. It
has been accomplished almost solely by
the outpouring of the sweat of laborers,
by fiercely determined competitive effort
which is in vogue all over the Soviet Union
through the so-called Socialist competitions — which means acceptance of quotas which are upped, and upped again.
Now the Don basin’s sadly needed
coal is gone and millions of Russians must
shiver all Winter long or almost freeze to
death. At best, most Russian homes will
only be able to be one-quarter heated
when the temperature is 30 or 40 below
zero. Only the greatly increased production in other coal mines and enormous
quantities of wood cut for fuel will enable
the people to survive the Winter.
To do their part in this national emergency the miners of the Moscow basin
have agreed to sacrifice two of their off
days a month in order to provide Moscow
with its essential coal supply. By the end of
the year, these two extra days’ production a
month will amount for every miner to an additional 10 tons of coal for Moscow — in the
estimates of the additional scores of thousands of tons of coal taken out of the voluntary sweat of the coal miners’ brows. The
same miners are taking no money for their
extra day-off work but contributing wages
toward a new tank column for the army.
Incidents like this are common in the
Soviet Union. One pit hewer of the Moscow basin the other day produced 260
percent of his norm in a single shift. Next
day a coal loader in the same pit boosted
his daily norm by 400 percent, just to show
his pal how it could be done.
Here is a brief quotation from a typical
industrial report in the Soviet press:
“Open-hearth furnacemen of the
Kuznetsk Iron and Steel Works have succeeded in cutting the time for a melt by 30
minutes during the past two months.”
Is there any other Allied country where
the saving of 30 minutes in industrial operation by the voluntary effort of the workers
themselves is regarded of such importance
as to be news? In Russia such accomplishments is not news. It is published for two reasons — as a matter of pride and as a badge
of honor for Russia’s industrial heroes.
The Times, September 7, 1942
The Issues At Stake
OIL ROUTE FROM BAKU
“GUARDIAN OF VOLGA”
From Our Diplomatic Correspondent
More depends on the battle for Stalingrad than on any single battle since the
one before Moscow last December – and
in many ways the dangers for Russia are
even greater and sharper now than they
were last December.
Even if Moscow had fallen the Russian armies would have remained unified,
and they would have preserved all their
sources of supply. The fall of Stalingrad
would bring a split in the Russian armies
for the first time, and would deprive the
central armies of their main route of supply of Baku oil.
ready shocked in their minds that the invader has reached the “Mother Volga,”
their pride and their legend. The strategic
importance is starkly apparent. The Germans are boasting that their right flank is
secure for a northern advance towards
Moscow. But the economic and other setbacks probably count for even more than
the strictly strategic ones.
The Times, September 8, 1942
PREPARING TO SMASH
GERMANY
PRESIDENT’S WAR REVIEW
EXPANDING POPULATION
From Our Own Correspondent
WASHINGTON, SEPT. 7
The pre-war population of the town was
about 500,000; it grew rapidly during the
first months of the war. The great tractor
plant, which even in 1935 was producing
38,000 tractors a year, was extended and
turned to the production of tanks. The motor-car industries were similarly developed
and changed. Probably some of these
factories have been hurriedly sent farther
east, but until a few months ago the town
was working and developing in the confident expectation that the Germans would
not reach it.
To the industrial loss has to be added
the agricultural. The Stalingrad province,
lying mainly to the west of the river, has
been one of Russia’s richest wheat areas.
With the neighbouring north Caucasus
and the Azov-Black Sea area, all recently
lost, it produced as much as the whole
of the Ukraine. These considerations will
bear heavily on the Russian people, al-
In his “fireside chat” to-night, which
was principally concerned with the need
for avoiding a domestic economic crisis by
prompt action, President Roosevelt gave a
front-by-front summary of the progress of
the war, which closed with the statement
that in Europe “the aim is an offensive
against Germany, toward which preparations are in progress in both the United
States and Britain.”
“The power of Germany must be broken on the battlefields of Europe,” the
President said. “Certain vital decisions
have been made. In due time you will
know what these decisions are – and so
will our enemies. I can say now that all of
these decisions are directed towards taking the offensive.”
Of the Russian front, President Roosevelt said that Hitler was still unable to
gain “the smashing victory” which almost
a year ago he announced had already
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09.42
That would be the heaviest blow yet
suffered by the Soviet war machine. The
“second Baku” area in the Middle Volga is
being rapidly developed, but these fields
produce little more than 7,000,000 tons –
about a quarter of the Baku production.
But Stalingrad is much more than the
guardian of the Volga. Its loss would be an
industrial setback greater than that which
the Russians suffered when Kharkov fell.
Kharkov was recognized to be in the danger belt, and a high proportion of its factories had been moved before the Germans
reached it. These factories had been taken east – some perhaps to Stalingrad, for
Stalingrad was within the eastern reception area. Its job was to take in evacuee
factories, not to send its own away.
84
been achieved. Important territory had
been captured, but Hitler had not been
able to destroy the Red Army. The Russians “are killing more Nazis and destroying more aeroplanes and tanks than are
being smashed on any other front,” he
said. The German Army, the President
declared, must spend another “cruel
and bitter winter” on the Russian front.”
In spite of any setbacks, Russia will hold
out and with the help of her allies will ultimately drive every Nazi from her soil. The
Russians are fighting not only bravely but
brilliantly.”
In the Pacific, he said, one major Japanese offensive had been stopped, but
the enemy still possessed great strength,
sought to retain the initiative, and would
strike hard again. “We must not overrate
the importance of our successes in the
Solomon Islands, although we may be
proud of the skill with which these local operations were conducted. At the same time
we need not underrate the significance of
our victory at Midway. There we stopped a
major Japanese offensive.
VITAL BATTLE FOR EGYPT
“In the Mediterranean and the Middle
East area the British, together with South
Africans, Australians, New Zealanders,
Indian troops, and others of the United
Nations, including ourselves, are fighting
a desperate battle with the Germans and
Italians. The Axis Powers are fighting to
gain control in that area, to dominate the
Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, and
to gain contact with the Japanese Navy.
The battle is now joined. We are well
aware of our danger, but we are hopeful
of the outcome.
“In the European area the aim is offen-
sive against Germany. There are at least a
dozen different points at which attacks can
be launched. You, of course, do not expect
me to give details of future plans, but you
can rest assured that preparations are being made here and in Britain towards this
purpose. The power of Germany must be
broken on the battlefields of Europe. Today, exactly nine months after Pearl Harbour, we have sent overseas three times
more men than we transported to France
in the first nine months of the first world
war. We have done this in spite of greater
danger and fewer ships.
“This is the toughest war of all time. We
need not leave it to the historians of the
future to answer the question as to whether we are tough enough to meet this unprecedented challenge. We can give that
answer now. The answer is ‘Yes.’ “ — Associated Press.
The Times, September 12, 1942
Reliance on the
Luftwaffe
BOCK’S HOPES OF QUICK
DECISION
FROM OUR SPECIAL
CORRESPONDENT
MOSCOW, SEPT. 11
A call to the defenders of Stalingrad
to make even greater efforts for the frustration of German plans is made by the
Army newspaper Red Star to-day. Though
Bock’s original plan to take the city by surprise, before the defence had been organized, has failed, the enemy is believed still
to be striving to obtain a quick decision,
sia, and a corresponding gain to Germany.
But the loss of Stalingrad would outweigh
all the previous losses. With the Germans
firmly established on the Volga the war,
both for Russia and for her allies, would
assume a new aspect; and at no time has
it been felt more strongly here that the
men of the Red Army – those grey, broadfaced, frowning, sweating, swearing Russians – are fighting and dying to preserve
the future prosperity of America and the
future existence of Britain.
QUARTERS FOR WINTER
The loss of Stalingrad would deprive
the Red Army of the only large city in a
very wide area. There is no other city
within 200 miles where an army powerful enough to organize a counter-offensive could winter; and it seems doubtful
whether, after the tremendous strain of
many weeks incessant battle, which has
absorbed so many reserves, a determined
counter-offensive on the Volga front could
be expected before next spring. Once in
firm possession of Stalingrad the German
Army could count on a period of recupera-
85
09.42
relying largely on his great concentration
of aircraft.
The defenders are urged to make of
Stalingrad a Soviet Verdun, and to have
no thought but to wear the enemy down by
the vigour of the defence and the power of
their counter-attacks. The road of retreat
is barred by the will of the people, and the
motherland demands that the Red Army
should fight to the last. The defending
troops are reminded of the great traditions
of Tsaritsyn – the former name of Stalingrad – and of Stalin’s order in 1918 under
which, with the approval of the Army, all
means of transport by which retreat might
be possible were sent far upstream on
the Volga. Then the Army knew that there
was no way left to them but the way of advance, and that should be their example
for to-day.
The Soviet Government do not conceal
their acute anxiety about the fate of Stalingrad, or the importance which they place
on the retention of control of the lower
reaches of the Volga. It is now two months
since the Russian people were told that
the giving up of further territory would reduce the country’s fighting capacity, and
would threaten centres and communications that were vital to the continued existence of Russia. Since then the Don and
Kuban granaries and the Maikop oilfields
have been lost; the enemy has lengthened
his grip on the Black Sea coast, and has
planted the Swastika on the Caucasian
heights; and Stalingrad has been placed
in peril.
So far the most serious losses to Russia have been in the matter of food. From
the Don steppe the Germans are reported
to be forcing the peasants to transport
grain to depots from which it is sent to the
west. All that goes is so much loss to Rus-
86
tion for a large part of its weary forces, and
could set about the consolidation of its grip
on the lower reaches of the Volga, the Kuban, and northern Caucasia.
It is true that the German failure in
front of Voronezh, and the vigorous local
pressure which the Red Army has kept
up along the Don at various points between Voronezh and Kletskaya suggest
that there is a potential menace to Bock’s
Volga salient from the north, and this might
develop if the German Marshal were to
fail before Stalingrad. If he should not fail,
however, he may decide to outflank this
force by advancing towards the north, up
the neck of the egg-cup formed by the Don
and the Volga.
The crucial question whether, if Stalingrad fell, the Red Army would be able
to launch a crushing offensive against the
Germans next year, in conjunction with
the allies, could only be answered with a
knowledge of the size of the Russian reserves, the amount of material the allies
can deliver, and the present strength of
the German Army. If such an operation
should be beyond the power of Russia,
then, however ardently hatred of the enemy might burn in Russian hearts, however
resolutely the people might stand behind
their leader, and however sullenly the peoples of the occupied areas might resist the
German yoke, the allies could draw no real
aid from Russia in their ultimate reckoning
with Hitler.
CONCENTRATED FORCES
The last few months have shown that
the enemy can with relative safety withdraw substantial strength from the subsidiary fronts to reinforce his main drives; this
is chiefly due to the extreme mobility of his
air shock groups and to his elaborate defence works covering sensitive spots on
the huge front. Nor are there very large
forces tied up in protecting German interests in the occupied territory. Those who
have been wandering about behind the
German lines and who have made their
way to Moscow relate that, except in the
towns and along vital lines of communication, the Germans are thinly dispersed
throughout the occupied zone. The Luftwaffe has already shown, near Leningrad,
how ruthlessly and effectively it is prepared to deal with rebellious villages.
If, then, the enemy could establish a
tenable line and could satisfy himself that
next spring the Red Army would be too
much enfeebled in man-power, deficient in
arms, and ill-placed strategically to launch
a counter-offensive on a massive scale,
he might be expected to transfer large
forces from Russia and to face the allies
with a formidable army including the elite
of his fighting forces, while he yet retained
sufficient strength in the East to attack the
Middle East from the Black Sea basin.
Much depends on Stalingrad. If Bock
were able to bring the campaign on the
Volga to an end in two or three weeks,
his forces would be in fair shape again
for campaigning next spring. But if heavy
fighting continues for another six or eight
weeks, though both sides are likely to be
thoroughly exhausted the gain is likely to
be on the side of the allies, whatever happens to Stalingrad itself, for it is highly improbable that the German Army could ever
recover from such a gruelling.
FOUR MONTHS LEFT
It is the realization that the whole issue
of the war may depend on the result of
They battered their way to within three
miles of Verdun before the cam­paign
collapsed. On this battlefield the Crown
Prince used up forty-three divi­sions of elite
troops, and the German army never quite
recovered. But it was not alone the stubborn defense of Ver­dun which saved the
city. The Germans were compelled to meet
almost simultaneous counter-offensives
The New York Times,
September 14, 1942
Stalingrad
Whether Stalingrad stands or falls, its
desperate defense must have a pro­found
effect on the development of the war. If the
Russians accomplish a miracle and hold
out, the event could mark the turning of the
tide not only in Russia but all over the world.
If the city falls, the war will certainly be pro­
longed, though the cost of a delayed victory will be felt by Germany in all her future
campaigns. She cannot re­vive the heaps of
dead sacrificed in the gigantic assault or restore the vital weeks lost on the Volga.
The defense of Stalingrad has been compared to that of Verdun in the World War.
The city itself is not a natural stronghold, as
Verdun was, but control of the banks of the
Volga is as important to Russia as domination of the Meuse heights was to France. In
February, 1916, the Germans launched their
attack on Verdun and maintained a relentless pressure for four months.
by Earl Haig on the Somme and by Gen­
eral Brusilov in Russia. No comparable relief seems in sight for Stalingrad, with the
Nazis even now in its south­ern suburbs.
The fall of Stalingrad would be a disaster not only for Russia but for all the United
Nations. Whatever cripples the Russian giant cripples us. In the words of the Soviet
army newspaper, Red Star, “Stalingrad is
Grozny, Baku and Transcaucasia.” This
means that its loss would cost Russia her
main oil supply and all the riches that lie
between the Caspian and Black Seas. It
would dislocate the Russian armies, reduce their striking power and permit Hitler
to face the West again. It may bring Japan
into Siberia. It might result in the conquest
of Egypt. Yet for Hitler even such a victory
would not be decisive. Russia will fight on.
87
09.42
the present operations that gives so keen
an edge to the general desire here for
the immediate opening of a second front
in Europe. Mr. Churchill’s phrase about
the Russian front, “This is September 8,”
has puzzled people here, for on that date
last year Moscow had yet to face its worst
ordeal. Optimists interpret the phrase to
mean that four months remain of the year
in which all Russia expects Great Britain
and America to fulfil the expectations of
their intervention in Europe. There are others whose reaction is: “Yes, September
8, and Molotov was in the West in May.
Where are your armies?”
88
The cruel Russian Winter is approaching.
Hitler can hardly launch another major offensive there this year. But if the Russians
fail now on the Volga, next year’s burden
on Britain and the United States will be immeasurably in­creased.
Chicago Daily Tribune,
September 20, 1942
RUSSIAN GIANT ‘V’ OF
INDUSTRY FAR FROM
NAZI GRASP
Hitler Has Only 2 of 20 Vital
Areas.
New York, Sept. 19 [Wide World].
If Hitler gets Stalingrad he will have
taken only three of Russia’s 20 important
industrial areas. And two of the three rate
as comparatively small.
In mileage to the remaining areas the
job looks even grimmer than the road
over which his troops have come — the
road which has taken 14 months. This information comes from maps and records
of Russian War Relief, Inc., and its president, Ed­ward C. Carter, a native of New
Eng­land.
It is true that 77,000,000 persons lived
in the areas Hitler has taken, and that
number is more than one-third the entire
Russian population. But Russian reports
indicate that 37,000,000 of these, largely
working and fighting men, escaped to swell
the man power still out of Hitler’s reach.
Of the 20 original industrial areas, five
are 200 miles or more in diam­eter, and 15
are comparatively minor, that is, centering
around a single city.
One Major Area Taken.
Hitler has taken only one major area,
Karkhov-Rostov, its capture completed
this summer. He has one minor area, Kiev,
taken last summer.
Remaining to the Russians are four
major and 13 [not including Stalin­grad] minor areas. The majors are Moscow, and,
750 miles to the east, across the Urals,
three more huge districts which form ‘a
giant V, its two arms stretching eastward
away from Hitler, respectively about 800
and 1,000 miles.
The German on the banks of the Volga
at Stalingrad stands at the farthest point
eastward of Hitler’s penetration of industrial areas. In front of him there stretches,
as wide as the United States, most of the
rest of Russia’s war industry. Imagine Stalingrad in the position of Balti­more, and
have the German travel northwest instead
of northeast as he is doing at Stalingrad.
Saratov Area the Nearest
At about the distance of Pittsburgh he
would find a virtual Russian Pitts­burgh
Tashkent 1,000 Miles Away.
From there the German soldier would
have to travel 1,000 miles, like going to
Texas, to the next major area, Tashkent.
From Stalingrad di­rectly southeast to
Tashkent it is also 1,000 miles.
From the Russian Chicago to the fifth
major area would be like going from the
Windy City to Denver. The area is Novosibirsk. En route, by a couple of 400 to 500
mile detours, the German could attack
two more minor areas, Kounrad and Zachita. Beyond Novosibirsk, at about the
distances of Hollywood and San Francisco, he would find two more, Kirkutsk and
Uean Ude.
Over on the Pacific ocean side are three
more industrial areas, self-suffi­cient even
to agriculture, namely Komsomolosk, with
a population of 15,000, and Khabarovsk
and Vladivo­stok.
Completing the 20 are Moscow, Len­
ingrad, and Murmansk. The two lat­ter rate
as minor areas.
Sees Long Fight Ahead.
Carter, who has visited Russia seven
times, says it will take a lot of lighting yet
before the Germans can close a southern
supply route to Russia. The route would be
the Caspian sea, and its two major north­ern
ports, Astrakhan and Guriev. The former is
about 250 miles from Stal­ingrad, the latter
about 400. South Caspian receiving ports
arc Baku, which the Germans might .take,
and more than 100 miles across the sea,
Krasnovodsk, which they apparently cannot take any time soon. The lat­ter is a rail
head. The northern Cas­pian is frozen from
December to April.
The Urals, reputed ramparts for Russia's new war production, might not be too
difficult to penetrate, Car­ter says. They
are 4,000 to 5,000 feet high, their slopes
gradual.
The New York Times,
September 20, 1942
Stalingrad Epic
Verdun on the Volga
The city, built by the toil of the young
nation and the skill of foreign engineers,
from which machines to cultivate the Russian harvests were poured out now is
a vast caldron in which two armies with
burning hate grapple for a decision.
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09.42
area. Nearest would be Sara­tov, about as
far as Altoona, Pa., from Baltimore. Then
would come Kuiby­shev, the provisional
capital, which is also an industrial center,
and lies about as far as Pittsburgh from
Balti­more. Beyond, into Ohio on this scale,
the German would come to another minor
area, Chkalov. And far north, equivalent to
about Ottawa, Can., he would find another
one, Kirov.
Next he would run into- Stalin’s Chicago, the biggest of all the Rus­sian industrial areas and the master key of the whole
plan, built from the ground up over the
last 20 years or more. This is Sverdlovsk,
about 500 miles in diameter. Its center is
750 miles east of Moscow, at the apex
of the industrial V. Here are steel, iron,
coal, nonferrous metals, planes, shells,
chemicals, and explosives. It is known that
somewhere in or near this region the Russians have eight or nine new synthetic rubber plants.
90
This was Stalingrad last week as described by The New York Times correspondent in Russia. The greatest battle of all times
had reached the city’s outskirts, had penetrated to its streets. Russian and German,
civil­ians as well as soldiers, were strug­gling
hand to hand with gun and tank and bayonet
for the possession of the key Volga city.
Amid the rubble of bombed houses a
portentous decision was in the making — a
decision that might affect the course of the
war for months, perhaps for years to come.
For Stalingrad means control of the Volga,
and the Volga means South Russia, storehouse of Soviet wealth, important lifeline
to Russia’s allies, one of the shields of the
Middle East, where the United Na­tions are
gathering their might. If Stalingrad fell the
Wehrmacht could flow on to the Caspian’s
shores and southward past the rich Caucasus oil­fields to the border of Iran. The Red
Army would be split in two, and Rus­sia and
the United Nations would face somber days.
500,000 Attackers
Upward of 500,000 Germans, it was
believed, were engaged in the assault
on the Volga citadel, defended by an unknown number of Red Army sol­diers and
thousands of its half-million population.
Stalingrad, straggling for twenty miles
along the banks of the broad Volga River,
was a valuable ob­jective in itself. It was
one of Russia’s greatest industrial centers,
built in the last twenty years with the help
of American technicians. Before the siege
it had processed the ores of the Donets
basin, the oil of the Caucasus; its great
factories had turned out tractors and farm
machinery for Soviet agri­culture in peacetime, tanks, guns and planes for the Red
Army in war. The mile-wide Volga, flowing
past steep cliffs on its western shore, had
been a busy artery of water-borne traffic
along which had flowed 7,000,000 tons of
oil yearly to all parts of Russia, and equal
amounts of foodstuffs and indus­trial goods.
It was twenty-five days ago that the assault on Stalingrad began. The Germans
had crossed the Don River to the northwest and southwest and their tanks had
pushed to within forty miles of the city’s
suburbs. Stalin­grad’s residents, waking
on the morn­ing of Aug. 26, could hear the
distant booming of the guns and in their
news­papers they saw for the first time
their city mentioned in the High Command
communiqué. Life in the Volga citadel took
on a quickened tempo — barges were unloaded faster, war factories worked day
and night while men, wo­men and children
aided Red Army sol­diers in throwing up
earthwork de­fenses, barbed wire and tank
traps on Stalingrad’s outskirts in preparation for the coming siege.
The Big Push
All through the days that followed, days
of hurtling heat beneath a relent­less sun,
Soviet capital’s defenders by similar units
last Fall.
War’s Most Important Action
The importance of Stalingrad’s re­
sistance transcended all other actions of
the war. If the Russians could hold it, all
of Germany’s gains in the great midsummer offensive might well be nullified. There
were Russian forces poised on his flank at
Voronezh which might smash through to
Rostov in a Winter attack. The threat might
be such that the German commander
would be forced to withdraw to the region
beyond the Don, giving up the Caucasus
prize. Such a defeat, after the terrible
strain of the nearly three months’ campaign, might turn the tide definitely against
Hitler’s forces. Conversely, for the Russians the loss of Stalingrad would mean a
retreat be­yond the Volga line, the isolation
and possible loss of the entire Caucasus
re­gion. For 200 miles east of the city there
is no point where an army could regroup
and prepare for a counter-offensive. The
Germans, firmly estab­lished on the Volga,
would be able to recuperate and consolidate their gains in Russia, perhaps to prepare new blows on other fronts, certainly
to withdraw large parts of their armies
to the West of Europe against the threat
of a second front by the Allies. The Red
Army, wearied by the campaign and with
valuable bases lost, might be crippled for
months as an effective attacking force.
Remaining Resources
If Stalingrad fell, Russia would still have
left the strength for protracted defense.
There are oil and minerals in the Urals, old
industries still func­tioning around Moscow
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09.42
the Germans pushed steadily closer while
Stalingrad stood at bay. Out on the fighting front the Wehrmacht shifted its pressure from north­west to southwest to center
in unend­ing attacks by wave upon wave
of men and machines. The city itself was
bat­tered ceaselessly by German planes
which dominated the sky. Railroads to
the north and the south were cut by the
German armies; only the broad Volga remained as a supply line from the Russian
hinterland. But Stalingrad stood, as Leningrad, Odessa, Sevastopol and countless other Russian cities and villages had
stood before, fighting back all through the
long retreat, taking its toll of German dead.
The Wehrmacht’s advance elsewhere was
likewise regis­tering gains: a new drive was
reported in the Middle Caucasus.
Last week the battle was raging close to
the city’s heart, where the Germans were
met by the supreme efforts of its defenders. German tanks had spear­headed the
thrust through the north­western suburbs;
German shock troops followed to fight the
Russians hand to hand.
It was a bitter and savage bat­tle that
raged on the city’s pavements —a struggle where ruined houses were turned into
forts, where men grappled and heaved
and swayed to hold a street corner or a
front door. It was a strug­gle of grimy, hatefilled individuals, in which counter-attacks
were meas­ured in terms of a house recaptured, a block of ruins won. At one place
the defenders fought with their backs to
the cliffs falling away to the Volga against
German tanks before them: in the clutter
of fallen buildings they at­tacked, man by
man, and drove the invaders back. Yesterday Moscow re­ported that troops from
Western Siberia had entered the fray, recalling the last-minute reinforcement of the
92
and Leningrad, new factory centers built
in the regions beyond the Volga. Russia
still has great reserve strength in manpower; her ar­mies have not been destroyed,
and the ranks thinned by the fallen could
be filled with young men to strike again.
In time, perhaps, a second front would
be opened by her allies among the de­
mocracies, bringing the day when the Fascist invader could at last be driven from
Russian soil. But if Stalingrad fell—and
the Russians fighting there knew this –
that day of liberation for all of their mother
country might be postponed for an indefinite time.
The New York Times,
September 21, 1942
Crisis At Stalingrad
On the blood-stained pavements of
Stalingrad the Russians have turned and,
house by shattered house, are driv­ing the
Nazis out of some of the streets of the city.
It is a breathless moment. On most of the
war fronts a pause has fallen as the world
watches the out­come of this greatest battle of all time. Not only is the spirit of resistance not failing; it seems to have had
a resur­gence in a tremendous demonstration of courage and stamina.
Almost a month ago the Germans
crossed the Don and moved on the Volga. For twenty-six days the Rus­sians,
outnumbered and cut down by crushing
mechanical power, withdrew step by step
from the furious assault of half a million
men. The heaps of Ger­man dead piled
ever higher, but always fresh divisions
pressed forward, paced by their tanks and
dive-bombers. Last week they reached the
plateau on which the city, or what enemy
bombs had left of it, stands. By the end of
the week they had surged into the streets.
The German High Command was ready at
last to announce the long-delayed fall of
Stalingrad with the customary flour­ish of
trumpets. Then something hap­pened.
Instead of the expected victory an­
nouncement from Berlin came excuses.
Rain fell. Russian reinforcements from
Western Siberia marched into the be­
leaguered city. Russian planes swept in to
meet and check the tanks and dive-bombers. The tide of street fighting hesitated,
then turned. Once more the Russians
were contesting strategic heights even beyond the city.
All we know now is that the doom of
Stalingrad had been postponed. The battle rages from crisis to hourly crisis under
a pall of mounting smoke. What is clear is
that the Russians will not yield the city at
a price or any price. They intend to hold it,
as they held Leningrad and Moscow. That
seemed impossible. Now, at the eleventh
hour, the world wonders if it may be barely
possible. If the miracle happens and Stalingrad does stand, even in smol­dering
The Soviet command can eliminate or
suppress all psychological factors which
might affect the fighting spirit. The Soviet
soldier is undoubtedly less sensitive than
any other soldier. The Russians are unusually capable of both taking it and giving
it. The war against the Soviet Union is a
fight against the most powerful military organization in the world, and to bring it to its
knees is a difficult task.
The Times, September 22, 1942
Decisions in this war mature only slowly. There is no other enemy in the world
with such artful skill in delaying decisions.
The enemy confronting us is of a completely different cast of mind, a thing difficult for us to grasp. No enemy can postpone decisions like the Russians and none
can equal them in keeping the scales ‘balanced by throwing’ in ever fresh masses.
Masses present a difficult problem both
to the German High Command and to
the German army, which has to deal with
them. On the other hand, the Soviet Command, having such masses at its disposal,
lacks tactical consciousness and the feeling of responsibility.
That is why measures are often taken which are in fundamental contrast to
our military ideas. We do not even know
whether these measures are the outcome
of a definite will. But they always succeed
in postponing the decision.
The German Command and Army were
sorely tried by the Russians’ unexpected
and seemingly improbable tactics, especially at the beginning of the campaign.
Against any other opponent, less hard and
less experienced, these measures would
have proved successful. To paralyse the
enemy’s moral resistance by hard blows
Russian Moral Strength
DIETMAR’S ADMISSION
NO QUICK GERMAN VICTORY
The German military spokesman, Lieutenant-General Dietmar, said in a broadcast last night:—
It must be impressed on every one that
decisions against such an enemy as Russia cannot be achieved in no time. Every
victory is the outcome of only the fiercest
fighting, and in many cases it comes only
after numerous crises. The fight against
the masses of Russian manpower and
equipment demands from the German soldier a moral strength the like of which has
never been known before.
The easiest and most complete victories are achieved when the moral resistance of the enemy – the will to fight – is
hit quickly. Against Soviet soldiers there
is no chance of achieving such a victory.
There is no chance either of weakening
this moral resistance by bitter experiences
– a process which in other armies spreads
like wildfire through the ranks.
DELAYING DECISIONS
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09.42
wreckage, Russia will have won a victory
to match in decisive effect the Battle of
England fought two years ago in the skies.
And whatever hap­pens, the Battle of Stalingrad will not have been fought in vain.
For time has been gained as well as a
lesson in devotion; attrition has taken its
toll of the enemy; and the faint hope that
seemed dead for Stalingrad rises for Russia, even though it may be low for the hour
on the banks of the Volga.
94
is out of the question in Russia, although
it was possible in the case of our former
enemies and will certainly be possible in
the future with any of our enemies, actual
or potential.
The Soviet soldier is far more strongly attached than any other soldier to the
system in which he finds himself. The authority of the Soviet leadership is limitless.
But the system which holds them together
is not unshakable. Every defeat suffered
by the Russians proves this anew. Their
recent appeal to commanders and troops
shows that serious set-backs have not
failed to have a weakening effect. The gigantic strain has already had its undermining consequences. — Reuter.
The Times, September 23, 1942
An Unintended Siege
AXIS PLAN FOILED
AT STALINGRAD
AIMS NOT ATTAINED
From Our Special Correspondent
STOCKHOLM, SEPT. 22
The position at Stalingrad has developed a further resemblance to that of
Leningrad: the Axis arc spans a large area
which includes the town, and the Germans have established what they call a
bolt position (Riegelstellung) at a narrow
part where they are obliged to fight on two
fronts – one against the forces inside and
the other against the forces attempting to
relieve them. Both these bolt positions are
now being assailed furiously by the Russians, the Leningrad one in the Sinyavino
area and the Stalingrad one from the north.
A siege is clearly not what the Germans
wanted at Stalingrad. They were more or
less content a year ago to leave Leningrad to fall automatically after the collapse
of Moscow and the whole Russian front,
which they believed to be imminent; but
they consider, and have repeatedly declared, that Stalingrad must be captured,
partly to remove the threat to their flank
and partly to relieve Bock’s forces for other
tasks.
The delay has lasted so long that the
capture of the city now or eventually will
scarcely secure the flank of the German
forces thrown into the Caucasus. The
main Russian armies are outside the arc,
and whatever losses those inside may
suffer, they are inflicting on the enemy an
equal or perhaps greater loss.
UNBROKEN ARMIES
Indeed, the battle of Stalingrad,
however it may go now, has to a great
extent turned the tables on the enemy.
The main object of the Germans, as in
all their enterprises this year, was to
smash and destroy Marshal Timoshenko’s armies and not merely to gain
territory, however impressive. This battle has not smashed the Russian armies, but, though it is also certain that
it has not smashed the German forces,
it has taken such a tremendous toll in
blood, material, energy, and time, that
the army is scarcely fit for any other major offensive before every wearied unit
has been rested and re-formed, and the
depleted ranks replenished.
There is evidence of this not only from
Russia but also from Germany, where
messages from front line correspondents published during the past fortnight
GERMAN IDEAS UPSET
German exasperation to-day seems
to be due largely to a realization that so
many of their ideas have been turned
upside down by the Russian campaign,
where victory after victory leaves their
enemy refusing to realize his defeat and
where everything turns out contrary to
their rules. Even if it is eventually captured, Stalingrad will not be a bolt position protected by the Volga, as the Germans envisaged it when its capture was
planned for the summer, as from the moment the Volga freezes hard it ceases to
be a barrier in either direction.
Relentless Russian pressure continues in the Voronezh, Rzhev, Lake
Ilmen and Sinyavino sectors. Mobility is everywhere impaired by the soft
ground, which is not likely to harden
again appreciably before the descent of
the winter frost. In spite of determined
resistance by reinforced defenders in
a carefully prepared bolt position, the
Russians are eating away the edges of
the “neck” of the German position from
Sinyavino. The bolt that bars the Russians from Leningrad shows no signs of
breaking however.
A German claim to have captured
Terek station, 50 miles east of Mozdok,
and another place which cannot be traced,
lacks substantiation, though an extension
of the line along the river Terek has been
foreshadowed since August. The station
is somewhat nearer to the Grozny oil than
Mozdok, but it also lies on the north side
of the river Terek, which has proved a
useful defence line for the Russians near
Mozdok. Nothing new is reported from any
other part of the Caucasus.
The Times, September 23, 1942
Stalingrad and the
Satellites
Stalingrad stands. Thus far the “miracle of Moscow” has been repeated. A
year ago the spearhead of the German
forces brought the enemy to within thirty
miles of the capital, and German war
reporters then gave us picturesque accounts of how they looked into Moscow
through field-glasses. It was as much
as the invader ever saw of the stout-
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09.42
lay emphasis on the hardships of the
German soldiers – the lack of sleep, the
rain and mud, the cold of the autumn
nights. Now there are careful references
to thinning ranks and wooden crosses.
One, in the Völkischer Beobachter, describes the dreary conditions outside
Stalingrad, where every day is a day of
battle, and where the ground between
them and their goal contains a German
“soldiers graveyard which grows bigger
daily.”
96
hearted city. The spearhead stuck fast.
A seemingly lost battle was retrieved –
narrowly, but it was enough. Parallels
can be pressed too closely, but so much
may be said of Moscow and Stalingrad:
that as the defence of the one was the
symbol of the 1941 campaign, so the
defence of the other is the symbol of the
1942 campaign. Moscow held, Stalingrad, a month after the launching of the
German drive, also holds. Its defences
may have been breached; its spirit is unbroken. The Germans are now putting
out some odd excuses for their failure
up to the present to hand the city as a
prize to HITLER. The moral strength of
the Red Army is admitted rather late in
the day. “The Soviet soldier,” it is said,
“is undoubtedly less sensitive than any
other soldier.” In fact, the Germans to
their cost – and our gain – have underestimated the faith of the Russians until
now. “Send us ten thousand men and
one copy of La Marseillaise, and I will
answer for victory,” a French general
wrote in the revolutionary wars. In much
the same spirit Stalingrad fights to-day.
The effect is already marked. The
German aims for this year’s campaign
will not be attained. The extent to which
the descent of winter will further affect
them is uncertain. What at least is certain
is that there is disillusionment in those
satellite States – among whom Italy must
now be reckoned – who were either bamboozled or browbeaten into taking part in
the attack on Russia. A remarkable dispatch from our Istanbul Correspondent
to-day says that the cocksureness of last
year has given place to nervousness and
to the one preoccupation of how they can
get out of the “mess.” Talk about an Axis
victory has been dropped. There will be
no sympathy here with leaders who were
ready enough to share in the spoils of
what was expected to be a cheap war,
and now find that they and their peoples
have been cheated. Nor should the reason for their change of view be misunderstood. It is the military achievements of
the Russians, combined with recognition
of the immense strength which we and
the Americans are building up and using
with growing effect, which are causing
the satellites to have second thoughts.
But disillusionment is not dissolution. If
this consummation is to be achieved, it
will only be by the hardest blows at the
still formidable strength of HITLER’S military machine. The shakiness of the satellites is a sign, but no more, of the new
phase on which the war has entered.
The New York Times,
September 25, 1942
STALINGRAD BURNS
AS PEOPLE BATTLE
Writer Describes Blazing City as
Blasted Ruin Held by Its
Residents’ Efforts
TANK MECHANICS IN FIGHT
Machines Driven From Factory to
Bolster Citizens’ Stand Against
Foe’s Advance
Wireless to The New York Times.
MOSCOW, Sept. 24
The Rus­sian writer and playwright Konstantine Simonoff, now in Stalin­grad, contributes to the army news­paper Red Star
the machines through the factory gates
straight to engage the enemy, who had
made a surprise break-through. Behind
them came companies of the citizens’
army, led by the police chief and a professor. As they fought the enemy in a
ravine, women workers revived the traditions of the civil war by bringing ammu­
nition to the frontline and caring for the
wounded and the enemy was held until
reinforcements ar­rived. Now the factory
yards are deserted, the windows are
smashed and the entrances barricaded
with pieces of machinery and damaged
tanks.
Mr. Simonoff has seen much of the
Eastern Front, but never such fighting,
desolation, courage and hatred as at Stalingrad, and never such assurance.
“After Stalingrad we shall be merciless,” he concludes.
97
09.42
today a remarkable dispatch from the city.
He describes the battle area as a fortymile belt along the Volga bend, consisting
of Stalingrad itself and clusters of satellite
villages, settlements and partly built-up
districts. At right angles to the river run
several deep ravines.
For a month this entire region has been
mercilessly bombed by the enemy and
now its terraced houses, piers, embankments and factories are shattered beyond
recognition. Fires rage day and night and
from across the Volga the entire western
horizon is light­ed by the flames.
The aged and the young live pre­
cariously in caves and in ravines, where
with a few rescued planks and blankets
they seek shelter from the wind and rain
and the enemy’s incessant hail of bombs.
Others have crossed the Volga on rafts
and in small boats—a peril­ous journey,
during which, in spite of the covering
smoke screen, many civilians have perished. The whole Stalingrad region has
be­come a battlefield. It has no in­habitants,
only defenders.
As in Sevastopol, the staff head­
quarters is underground in close cellars,
where women telephonists and messengers work tirelessly in the turmoil.
Checking points have been placed in
the top floors of modern buildings and
from these the whole smoky battlefield
is vis­ible. Mr. Simonoff describes how
from one such crow’s nest he watched
German motor cyclists drive into the suburbs. Some of the machines were blown
up in the mined streets and from others
tommy gunners jumped and began to sift
through the ruins.
He also visited a factory, from which,
in the earlier stages of the attack on the
city, mechanics re­pairing tanks drove
98
The New York Times,
September 26, 1942
Nazi Plans Held
Disrupted By Soviet
Stalingrad Stand
By DREW MIDDLETON
Wireless to The New York Times.
LONDON, Sept. 25
The month-long battle for Stalingrad
has seriously disrupted Germany’s plans
for smashing the military and economic
structure of the Soviet Union this year and
has limited the operations of the German
armies in Southern Russia to minor objectives for the rest of 1942, British military
observers declared today.
These results of the long and bitter defense of the city are viewed as more important than the considerable German losses
in men and materiel, which, it is pointed
out, are not believed to have reached
those suffered at Verdun in World War I
on any single day or to have exceeded the
average German and Austrian losses of
more than 2,000 killed each day through
the four years of the war.
Strategic Key Elusive
The Germans’ plan for the Sum­mer
and early Autumn of 1942 embraced the
overrunning of the Caucasus and the
seizure of its oil resources. This was
possible only after Stalingrad had been
elim­inated as a threat to German com­
munications with the Caucasus or a sally
point for a Soviet offensive. The city itself
was expected to be used as an anchor
for the German right flank in a northward
drive on Moscow either this Autumn or
next Spring.
Thus the speedy reduction of Stalingrad in time to allow other plans to mature was vital to the success of the general operations in the south, the British
military observers said. When Stalingrad
first appeared in the Soviet com­muniques
on Aug. 25 the Germans expected it to
fall “within two weeks at the most,” it is
recalled.
Now, after a month of heavy fighting,
if and when Stalingrad falls it would be
a signal for Ger­man consolidation rather
than fur­ther advances on a large scale.
Should the Nazis fail to storm the city
— and recent German attempts to minimize Stalingrad’s strategic importance
show this is a prospect in the minds of
the General Staff — the enemy might be
forced to withdraw beyond the Don for
the Win­ter.
To the south in the Caucasus, British military observers believe, signs of
German consolidation already are apparent. The observers predict that the
German Army will be unable to advance
southeast­ward along the shore of the
Black Sea from Novorossiisk, where
the only road is cut out of rocky hills at
the water’s edge. A sea-borne attack on
the lower Caucasus also is held unlikely
because the Ger­mans will be unable to
develop Novorossiisk as a base in the
face of Soviet attacks. The road to the
Western Caucasus is barred by the Red
Army, some of whose divisions have not
yet been engaged. “Thus, even if Stalingrad falls tomorrow, which seems most
un­likely, its protracted defense has fixed
the Germans’ plans for the Winter,” one
observer remarked.
German casualties in killed dur­ing the
assault on Stalingrad are estimated to
have been around 2,000 daily. Observers
here do not expect these to weaken the
German war potential appreciably. They
point out that the German and AustroHungarian armies lost an average of 2,070
men killed daily throughout the first World
War and the effect was not apparent until
the Summer of 1918. In the present war
German losses did not reach sizable figures until the in­vasion of Russia began.
German prospects of weathering the
Russian Winter are believed to be better this year, since large stocks of heavy
clothing and field stoves have been accumulated. Generally, the military observers
forecast a Winter consolidation of conquered territory by the Ger­mans while the
Soviet armies nib­ble at German advance
positions, which for the second consecutive year will have been halted short of
their objectives.
British spokesmen emphasized the
Eastern Front's drain on Ger­man home
economy. Dingle M. Foot, Parliamentary
Secretary for the Ministry of Home Economy, speaking at Glasgow today, called the
German home front «far more vulnerable»
than fifteen months ago as a result of continual stresses, such as the «voluntary»
collections of household reserves.
Occupied Russia is «seriously de­
ficient» in cotton, wool and other textiles,
Mr. Foot said, and German civilians now
are forced to make their clothing coupons
last considerably longer than previous­ly.
Enemy industrial plans have been disjointed by the necessity of converting more
than 30,000 miles of Russian railroads to
standard European gauge and locomo-
tives and cars are being constructed with
«manpower and plants pre­viously engaged in the production of munitions,» he
added.
The Times, September 28, 1942
Russia’s Winter Ordeal
A WARNING FROM MR. WILIKIE
GRIM BALANCE-SHEET
From Our Special Correspondent
MOSCOW, SEPT. 27
Two grave warnings that Russia is facing an acutely critical danger have been
issued this week-end in Moscow. One was
given to the Red Army by the newspaper
Red Star, and the other was given to the
American people by Mr. Wendell Willkie
at the conclusion of his 10-day visit to the
Soviet Union. The Red Star provides the
military background to the observations
which Mr. Willkie made to a meeting of the
Anglo-American Press Association shortly
before he attended the Kremlin banquet
which M. Stalin held in his honour.
The Donetz Basin, many regions of the
Don and Kuban, and an important part of
the northern Caucasus with its population
of peasants and workers, its grain, minerals, fuel, and factories have fallen to the
enemy during the summer campaign, the
Red Star writes.
VICTORY OR DEATH
Mr. Willkie, whose contact with the
Russian leaders gives his statements a
certain authority, drew some conclusions
from these losses. Over 60,000,000 peo-
99
09.42
Drain Not Yet Ominous
100
ple are living under German domination
– one-third of the total population of the
Soviet Union; the Red Army is losing men
at the rate of over 10,000 a day; the food
situation is already serious and is likely
during the winter to become grim; the fuel
shortage is scarcely less serious, for cold
since the outbreak of the war; and what
impressed him most was the amount of
hard work that was being done. There was
not a single person with whom he talked at
the front, at factory or farm, whose family
had not other members fighting, working,
or killed. From children under 10 whom he
found at factory benches to Volga veterans on the farms, every one was forcing
the pace of the war.
“PUBLIC PRODDING”
and hunger together can be deadly where
one of them alone may be resisted; civilian
clothes are scarce, and there is an acute
lack of some medical supplies.
It is a dark picture, but no one who has
observed the development of events here
would quarrel with it. But Mr. Willkie had
more to say. He found the Russians fighting their people’s war with a resolution
and a fury unslackened by military reverses, temporary hardships, or impatience
with their allies, and determined to see it
through. In a striking phrase, Mr. Willkie
stated that the Russians had chosen victory or death but that they spoke only of
victory.
Mr. Willkie found a combative mood
throughout his stay, during which he had
greater opportunity to see the Russian
war effort and the common man behind
it than has been afforded to any foreigner
The resolution of the Russians, the inherent dangers in the situation, and the
general mood of impatience have convinced Mr. Wendell Willkie that America,
in cooperation with Great Britain, should
force the pace of the war as much as possible, always with the reservation that the
military advisers do not think the risks too
great. But that these advisers may need a
little “public prodding” is also Mr. Willkie’s
view. The opening of a real second front
in Europe at the earliest possible moment
that the military advisers consider it likely
to be successful, an increase in material
aid in the form of arms, food, medical supplies, and clothing, and the bombing of
Germany on an even heavier scale are the
ways in which Mr. Willkie considers that
America cap speed her own victory and
give aid to Russia.
How the Russians themselves judge
the military situation is indicated by the
Red Star. The battles now raging in the
south are of a decisive character not only
for Russia herself but for her allies. The
fall of Stalingrad would rend the Russian
fronts asunder and would secure the left
flank of Bock’s salient in the Caucasus.
It would provide the German forces with
time for recuperation and with winter
TALK WITH M. STALIN
Mr. Willkie had ample opportunity to
discover the grave mood of the country.
He spent 2¼ hours with M. Stalin – “a man
obviously carrying a heavy burden” – who
answered every question with the utmost
candour; he spent the greater part of a day
with one of the Red Army’s most brilliant
young generals; and he conferred with
members of the Government both in Moscow and Kuibyshev.
His visit was not only that of a gatherer
of facts. Apart from his special mission as
the President’s personal envoy, Mr. Willkie
told Russia in forceful and authoritative
language of America’s war effort, and his
physical vigour, his abounding energy,
and, in spite of the strain of work, his continual good humour made him an ideal
envoy from the West. He never failed to
pay high tribute to Great Britain’s part in
the war, and particularly to Mr. Churchill.
The longest of the many toasts proposed
at last night’s banquet was Mr. Willkie’s
toast to Mr. Churchill. Nothing but good
can come out of this visit for all the allies
of Russia, as well as for Russia herself. It
is Mr. Willkie’s sincere desire that in giving
greater aid to Russia the allies should realize that they are aiding themselves. Next
summer, as he says, it may be too late to
do either.
The Times, September 28, 1942
“RUSSIA NEARING
EXHAUSTION”
RIBBENTROP’S GIBES
GERMANY READY
FOR SECOND FRONT
Ribbentrop, the German Foreign Minister, speaking at a reception in Berlin yesterday to mark the second anniversary of
the Three-Power Pact, said:—
“This pact was concluded first of all as
a warning to the United States of America.
As President Roosevelt and his Jewish
clique of warmongers continued to drive
the American people against their own
will into the war it was necessary that they
should know with whom they would have
to deal. America’s war was Roosevelt’s
own creation. He deliberately challenged
Japan with unacceptable demands. The
three nations – Germany, Italy, and Japan
– form a single unit, no part of which shall
lay down its arms until the new order is assured.
“The battle of Stalingrad is proof of the
heroic and aggressive spirit of the Axis nations. We know, all of us, politicians and
soldiers, and the whole of the German
people, that this battle will be won by the
101
09.42
quarters, for though the ruins of Stalingrad itself offer little shelter the consolidation of their position on the Volga
would enable the Germans to keep the
Russians at a safe distance and in the
villages of the steppe, often from 10 to
15 miles apart, the great army could winter safely.
Moreover, the liberation of troops that
would follow on the fall of Stalingrad would
increase the threat to Russian positions
farther north. Leningrad is still besieged,
and though the position of its defenders
is appreciably stronger than it was a year
ago, any increase in the strength of Leeb’s
forces would create a very grave situation.
To lose Stalingrad is to lose the springboard for a future Russian offensive.
102
bravery and gallantry of the German soldiers. Perhaps this battle in later years will
become the symbol of Europe’s light for
freedom.
“With the taking of this town – the link
between north and south Russia, the Volga life line – our most dangerous antagonist will have suffered a blow from which
he will never recover. In Russia an area
of 1,600,000 square kilometers, equivalent
to the whole of Germany, France, and the
United Kingdom, is already firmly in German hands.
CONVOYS TO RUSSIA
“Russia is nearing exhaustion in her
man-power, food, and raw materials. All
British and American convoys to Russia
have almost certainly been completely destroyed. Everything will be done in future to
prevent any further supplies from reaching
Russia from outside. Churchill has spoken
of a second front. We expect attempts like
Dieppe to be repeated – we are ready for
them. Any attempt to create other fronts
can no longer stop the increasing paralysis of Russia.
“Shipping has become an insoluble
problem for the allies, which will prevent
the Anglo-Americans from creating decisive battle fronts with the Axis Powers.
Last year the Axis Powers sank at-least
twice as much, and probably more, enemy tonnage than could be replaced by
buildings. The food problem in Europe has
been definitely settled by the conquest of
the Ukraine and the Kuban. The Axis Powers have acquired an advantage over the
allies in raw materials and man-power. All
Europe is one armament factory working
for us. We have 450,000,000 men at our
disposal.
“EVERY BOMB COUNTED”
“The future will show whether Churchill’s bomb warfare against the civilian population was a good or a bad idea. Every
single bomb, every destroyed home,
every dead person makes the German
peoples more determined to make the
British pay. Every bomb is counted with
great care, and the time will come when
we shall deal finally with this British aircraft-carrier off Europe. We can assure
Churchill and Eden, who are principally
responsible for the British declaration of
war on Germany, that we shall not overlook them on the day of victory.
“The war in Russia has not exhausted
the Axis Powers. On the contrary it has
hardened them – has made them secure everywhere. In Russia we shall go
on striking at the Soviet until all danger
which threatens Europe from Bolshevism
has been abolished. Time is now definitely
working for the tripartite Powers.”
Ciano, the Italian Foreign Minister, in
a broadcast speech on Saturday, said:
“We celebrate this anniversary with unshakable will to see our task through to
the end, with faith in our victory, and with
a certainty of the realization, of the ideals
for which we are to-day strenuously and
heroically fighting.”
General Tojo, Japanese Prime Minister, speaking in Tokyo on Saturday, said:
“British and American plans for a counteroffensive are beginning to take a more
definite form. The real developments of the
war will be seen in the future.” — Reuter.
Abroad
Why Stalingrad Produces So
Much Emotion
By ANNE O’HARE McCORMICK
The day-by-day story of the fight for
Stalingrad has made the war more real
to distant places than any engage­m ent
since the conflict began. When the two
greatest land armies in the world are
locked in battles for streets and houses, the very narrowness of the frame
in which the terrific action is crowded
gives the picture an un-equaled clarity.
In this long-drawn-out contest for
a city the whole global struggle is re­
duced to a scale the human imagina­
tion can compass. In Stalingrad we see
more vividly than before just what this
war is like. We realize how fierce and
merciless and desperate it is, and this
realization produces an emotion hardly
matched by the feeling evoked by Dunkerque or Bataan or the bomb­ing of
London.
This is partly because Stalingrad is
the climax of a decisive campaign and
partly because it coincides with the recognition that there is no immunity anywhere from the kind of fighting we watch
at Stalingrad. But largely it is because for
the first time this Summer the war has
become truly universal; throughout this
country and this hemi­sphere the understanding that every battle involves us all
has at last penetrated below the reaches
of the mind to touch the aching depths of
the heart.
Our Amazing Army
For Americans Stalingrad makes the
war more vivid than other battles for still
another reason. It is a man-to­-man combat
fought at a time when every town in the
land is conscious of its own contribution of
manpower to the world-wide struggle. At
every turn we see American boys turned
into sol­diers; almost overnight, it seems,
the so-called “soft” generation has been
transformed into an army that amazes
even its commanders by its temper and
its quality. Wherever one goes, the trains
and the railway stations are crowded with
these new soldiers, and any one who
has observed other armies in the process of mobilization — German and Italian,
French and British, Ru­manian and Turkish — must be struck by the extraordinary
physical fitness of these young Americans,
moving by stages toward that second front
which is forming somewhere under the fog
of talk.
These boys are better than fit. Per­
haps they should be expected to be taller,
better turned-out and stronger than other
armies. They are the chil­dren of abundance, brought up in a land where plumbing, higher education and space to grow
in are more univer­sal than anywhere
else. But also they might be expected to
be spoiled by ease and comfort, central
heating and auto-mobiles. It was imagined that they had been made skeptical
by the doubts and questions of disillusioned teachers.
They were supposed to have been
made cocky, undisciplined and selfish by
too-indulgent parents.
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09.42
The New York Times,
September 30, 1942
104
The British Impressed
As Good as They Look
Well, look at them! One has only to
meet the new American army travel­ing
about the country to feel that if this is the
generation this country has produced in
the unsettled years be­tween this war and
the last, we have more to fight for than the
most fervent interventionists imagined. If
these boys are the fruit of the American
sys­tem and the emanation of the American spirit, they prove that nobody on earth
has so much to defend as we have. Seen
en masse, they are more moving than the
sight of the Stars and Stripes waving in the
Solomon Islands.
Their deportment is almost too good to
be true. Presumably they are being taught
to be tough, trained in the dreadful art of killing, but they never fail to give up their seats
to women in crowded cars, they offer to
carry your bag when there are no porters.
They are gay and modest, friend and polite. In England their good manners impress
the British, themselves one of the politest
of peoples. But what impresses Americans
most of all is their attitude; they believe in
themselves and in their country with a casual and mat­ter-of-fact faith that shames the
doubt­ers and debaters among their elders.
Stalingrad is a flaming background for
this procession of American sol­diers. We
see the enemy now not only as the opponent of the fighting Rus­sians but of our
own fighting men. The picture of the reality
of war is im­printed even more vividly upon
our minds by the stories of the performance of Americans in action.
The arresting report published in The
Times yesterday from Hanson Baldwin on
the fighting of the Marines in the Solomons
portrays the Japanese as the best jungle
fighters in the world, “hard, ruthless, brave,
well-equipped” and full of tricks. It warns
us of the kind of foe we have to meet in
the Pacific, just as the Volga battle shows
us how des­perately the Germans fight. On
both sides of the world we are opposed by
fanatic and thoroughly organized armies.
But Mr. Baldwin also makes us see how
quickly the American doughboy develops
into a jungle fighter. The story of Private
Morrison and his buddy at Guadalcanal is
an epic of in­credible courage and resourcefulness on the part of “green” Americana.
The short annals of our war are al­ready
rich in such epics. They prove that the
cheerful boys coming out of the camps are
as good as they look. How can the rest of
us ever live up to them?
10.42
10.42
107
Chicago Daily Tribune,
October 4, 1942
GODLESS
COMMUNISM
It is a key theory of communism that religion is the opium of the people and that
the role of the churches is to deliver the
masses to their exploiters. The Marxist
attack on property and its possessors in
Russia was accompanied by the attack on
religion, the churches, the clergy, and the
devout. Church edifices were destroyed or
desecrated and taken for party uses. The
Society of the Godless was organized to
promote irreligion. Clergymen were driven
underground.
The Russians are a tenacious people
and altho they were terrorized they clung
to the forbidden faith. They risked their
lives as men of faith have done before to
obtain the satisfaction of their religious
needs and the godless dictators found
that they were dealing with an indomitable spirit of resistance. Gradually the faith
of the devout forced a modification of the
edicts of the irreligious and a form of worship was permitted under conditions which
would be regarded as intolerable in any
land in which liberty of conscience was
even a restricted privilege.
In the most humiliating conditions
which could be devised the churches were
allowed to minister to such communicants
as had the courage to face the enmity of
the commissars and the activities of the
secret police. Altho the godless were permitted to spread their doctrines and campaign politically for recruits, the churches
were forbidden any evangelical activities
and all that was allowed was service divested of rites sacred to the congregation
and limited almost to a mockery of divine
worship.
In spite of the concessions which the
people’s tenacity forced out of their heathen dictators, religion and the churches
were outlaws. The Russian has not yet
won the right freely to proclaim his religious belief, celebrate its rites, and receive
its sacraments as a person fully entitled to
the blessings of even a moderately free
civilization. The church is humiliated and
religion is officially held in obloquy. So far
as dictatorship can obliterate the religious
impulses of people, it has done so.
The dogma of the Communist cult still
asserts that religion is the opiate of the
people. It still holds in its tenets that the
church and worship should be abolished.
These are the doctrines of the Communist
party in Russia and that is the parent organization which gives the party line to its
followers everywhere.
The American Communist party takes
its cues from the Moscow Comintern,
which in these days of stress has been
retired to the background in Russia itself
108
but is the international and revolutionary organization. The American Communist party
is directly related not to the Russian people
who are putting up this heroic struggle, but
to the international intriguers which seek to
establish abroad the worst features of the
vindictive and destructive cult.
The true character of communism is
not to be disguised by the heroism of the
Russian people, despite the efforts of the
American Communists to use that heroism as protective coloration. Neither are
the stubborn piety of the Russian people,
and the concessions to religion that that
tenacity has forced from the ruling party,
to be taken as any indication of a changed
attitude of communism and Communists
toward religion, altho the Communists and
their apologists in this country have practiced that deception, too.
The Communists are pledged to the
remembered by voters when they find the
names of New Deal rubber stamps on the
ballot.
We have been in Stalingrad town for
several weeks now, but the ene­my has
never refused us rapid success so definitely as here. There is not a town in the
whole of the pres­ent war that has witnessed what German soldiers hape had to
endure here. * * * The Russians refuse to
declare themselves beaten.
destruction of religion wherever they can
accomplish it. They cannot accomplish
that, or anything else, in this country of
their own strength. It is only by working
thru the New Deal that they have made
themselves a force to be reckoned with in
American politics. That is something to be
Thus the German war correspondent
Willy Beer described for his readers last
week the town whose resistance to the
Wehrmacht’s blows has become a symbol
of bravery to all the United Na­tions. The
people at home read his words while their
armies were massing for another “all-out”
assault on the de­fenses that have resisted
them for a month and a half. Soviet dispatches asserted that Stalingrad was facing its “darkest hour,” that the Red Army
had retreated in the northwest factory dis­
trict of the city, a sector which had seen
some of the bloodiest fighting of the siege.
The reports added that all withdrawals
were orderly, with no sug­gestion of panic,
but it appeared that the situation at Stalingrad, not only for Russia but all the United
Nations, had again reached a critical point.
The Germans pressed their revital­
ized assault with four infantry divi­sions—
The New York Times,
October 18, 1942
Stalingrad
The Peril Deepens
Gains Weighed
That there is deep disappointment in
Germany over the results of the Sum­mer’s
campaigning appeared certain. Great
gains have been made, rich food producing areas overrun. The Maikop oil fields, at
least, have been captured and the Grozny
fields brought within bombing range. But
the Russian armies still were resisting, and
at Stalingrad they held a bridgehead over
the Volga that might menace all the rest
that had been accomplished. From Stockholm came reports that Colonel General
Franz Haider, chief of the German General Staff, operating from Herr Hitler’s
headquarters, had been dismissed from
his post, following General Field Marshal
Fedor von Bock into retirement.
Adolf Hitler might not have achieved his
goal, but he had inflicted serious losses on
the Russians. The source of much of the
Soviet’s food had gone to the Germans,
interior communications were upset and it
was no longer easy to bring the oil of the
Caucasus north to the fighting armies. As
Russia en­tered her second Winter of war
foreign correspondents in Moscow reported that the questions “When will we re-
ceive aid from our allies?” “When will there
be a second front?” were still on every
one’s lips.
Though the Russians and the other
United Nations might not see eye to eye
on the timing, there was new evi­dence
last week that there was no dis­agreement
on the need for a second front. President
Roosevelt, in a radio address to the nation, declared that the military leaders of
the United Nations had drawn up plans
for diverting ene­my forces from China and
Russia by new offensives against Germany and Japan. “An announcement” he
said, “of how these offensives are to be
launched, when and where, cannot be
broadcast over the radio at this time.”
From conquered Europe came indi­
cations that the Germans were worried
about just that point. It was revealed that
over the past month British Com­mando
forces had carried out a series of raids on
the coast of Normandy. Speculation in the
press of Paris and Madrid turned to other
points — Dakar in Africa, the coast of Norway. Every­where there was a feeling that
soon an offensive would come.
Daily Boston Globe,
October 18, 1942
Why Petya Became a
Russian Soldier at the
Age of 12
Leland Stowe in His Most Dramatic
Tale From the Russian Front Relates
the Tragic and Thrilling Story of an Orphan Lad Who Was Adopted by a Guerrilla Band — the Little Boy Refused to
Be Sent to a Children’s Home When His
Parents Were Killed by the Germans
109
10.42
60,000 men—and a tank division supported by aircraft. Their losses con­tinued
staggering, an unsuccessful at­tempt to
take a single street costing them twentythree tanks and 350 troops. In Berlin the
Nazi propaganda machine complained not
only of an en­emy refusing to declare himself beaten but of bitter weather setting in.
Frost and cold rain were heralding the second Winter on the steppes and the Wehrmacht still had not achieved what seemed
to be its major goal for 1943; conquest of
the Caucasus and its oil.
110
and Finally Became Messenger for the
Intrepid Band That Fought for Russia
Behind the German Front
Leland Stowe today, in the fifth of his
masterly word-pictures of life and death
on the Russian front, tells the story of a
12-year-old boy soldier or rather he lets
Petya tell the story in his own words, a
tragic and thrilling story which once read
can never be forgotten. Petya is an orphan,
“adopted” by a Red guerrilla band. How he
came to be an orphan leads to a tale of almost unbelievable Nazi cruelty.
By LELAND STOWE
Special Radio to the Globe
Copyright, 1942, by the Boston Globe
and Chicago Daily News.)
WITH THE RED ARMY ON THE
RZHEV FRONT
“What a little soldier. He must be a boy.
What’s he doing in uniform?”
We were just riding up to the headquarters of Capt. Emma’s unit when Ivan the
Terrible swerved our jalopy within sight of
the smallest soldier I had seen since Jannina, Greece. But be looked so miniature
and out of place in this front sector of the
badlands that I couldn’t quite believe my
eyes. The other commissar, who was in
the front seat, the battalion commissar,
answered before Capt. Emma could.
“O, that’s Petya. Sure, he’s a soldier.
He’s been adopted by the regiment.”
“Adopted?”
“That’s right,” said Capt. Emma, “quite a
lot of Red Army units have adopted orphan
boys. If this one is like the others, he probably lost his parents and home when the Nazis came. Then the regiment adopted him.”
Petya Joins the Party
So here was Petya Kaputovski standing
all of four feet, six or seven inches, in his
trim, coffee-grey Red Army Winter overcoat
aid smiling shyly. He is 12 years old and if
anything his boyish face looks even more
boyish underneath his Army cap with the
Red Star on its front. The tanned skin of his
face looks like satin — there is scarcely a bit
of down on his upper lip — but his cheeks
are flowing with ruddy crimson.
Petya climbs in the back seat with Capt.
Emma and I climb in the front with Ivan,
who has used up another precious oblong
of the back page of Pravda for his morning
cigarette. Petya, it should be explained, is
one of those musical Russian diminutives
— it means, little Peter and you pronounce
it Peetya.
The things which impress me most
about Petya are his remarkably soft voice
and the straight, clear gaze of his handsome gray eyes.
the steps. And then when the Germans had
filled the big house with people, they set it on
fire — they burned it down.”
Suddenly Petya’s voice had become
dull, almost lifeless, yet his eyes never faltered.
“How many people were in the big
house?” I asked.
“There were very many—more than
100,” Petya said.
Flight
Petya stopped again suddenly and
looked away — away toward the front.
Capt. Emma looked at me but what I saw
in her eyes was something far more lasting and unstemmable than tears have ever
been. What I saw was the explanation of
why she, a women and a mother, was war
commissar in a front-line regiment in the
Red Army.
“Did you know any of the children
whom the Germans put in the big house?”
I asked Petya.
“There was Kalia and Genia — they
lived in our street. And Valodia — he was
12 too and we went to school together.
There were others whose names I don’t
remember. Then there were little children.
Some of them couldn’t walk and their
mothers carried them when the Fascist
soldiers pushed them into the house.
“Then the Germans began to set fire to
all the other houses,” Petya continued. “It
was getting dark and I knew they would
burn our house too and then we would
have to run out and be killed. So when they
were setting fires to the other houses further away, I told Shura that we must crawl
behind the shed and run to the woods. So
we crawled behind the shed and out into
the field where the fires did not throw much
111
10.42
This is really Capt. Emma’s interview.
After all, she is just as interested as I am.
Besides she is not very much bigger than
Petya and I can see that Petya feels the
warmth in her dark eyes. There hasn’t
been a mother or any other women in his
life for many long months now. He sits very
erect in the rear seat like a soldier should
sit and he answers Emma’s questions as
a soldier should answer them.
We are starting back across the battleravaged bogspotted marsh-lands with a
truck to pull us out of ditches, through pools
and across brooks and quagmires. “When
Capt. Emma gets a section of Petya’s story, she relays it to me in French or Spanish
and usually I can write it down fairly well,
because we are stuck in the mud again
or being hauled by the truck. Petya tells
his story very simply and when we ask for
more details he never hesitates. You need
not watch his face very long nor listen to
the gentleness of his voice to understand
how very easy it would be for Petya to get
adopted anywhere in the world.
“I lived in a village near Kalinen,” Petya
is saying. “The Germans came in October.
Right away they looked for all Jews and
all relatives of partisans in our village. My
father and many other men had gone into
the forest to be partisans. The Germans
came looking for people in every house.
When they came to our house I hid under
the steps and my brother, Shura, hid with
me. Shura was 9 years old.
The Fascists took my mother and my two
other younger brothers and my two sisters.
They tied their hands with rope. Then they
led them away and put them into the biggest
house in our village. And all the families of
partisans and all the Jews they could find
they put in the same house. We were terribly frightened but we could see from under
112
light yet — and then we ran as fast as we
could.
Meets the Partisans
“But I was barefooted. I didn’t dare go
back to get my shoes, so I ran barefooted.
It was very cold, too, after we got in the
woods. I knew our Partisans couldn’t be very
far away, and our father was with them. So
Shura and I kept walking until we found the
Partisans — and then they told us that my
father had already been killed fighting.”
By this time we were up to the axle in
bog and the truck was only able to haul us
out by a series of frantic jerks. When we
finally got out again Petya resumed where
he had left off.
“The Partisans gave us something to
eat and tied some rags around my feet. But
they were having big fights with the Fascists and said that we couldn’t stay with
them. One man took us to find a Red Army
unit. We had to go at night. We walked all
that night. The next day we found our Russian soldiers. They sent Shura away to be
put in an orphanage.
“But I said, I don’t want to go into an
orphanage or any children’s home. I am
big enough. I want to stay with the Army. I
want to fight in place of my father. I am big
enough. I can fight.
I begged the commander very hard, so
at last they let me stay. But I was very sick
for a long time. I couldn’t sleep. I kept remembering my mother and brothers and
sisters and the fire.”
Petya’s small childish voice fell away
then into silence.
Capt. Emma looked at me and I looked
at Capt. Emma. We didn’t say anything
more for awhile. Then Capt. Emma said.
“Nerves.”
Then, providentially our car hit another bog — and about 10 minutes later we
were crawling ahead again.
Wounded in Fight
“After the commander said I could stay
I was very happy,” Petya said and now his
grey eyes became lustrous. “They gave
me a uniform, a real Red Army uniform,
and then the soldiers gave me shooting
lessons. First they gave me lessons with a
pistol and then with a rifle and later with an
automatic — but I don’t know the machine
gun yet.’
Petya’s face became suddenly sad as
he made that confession but he added
swiftly, “But I know the German automatic
very well.”
Capt. Emma’s eyes were laughing
now as she translated and Petya’s smile
as he looked toward me was like that of a
boy who has found his first air rifle on the
Christmas tree.
“At first I went on scouting trips with our
soldiers in the forest,” Petya said. “Then
one day we had a fight and the Germans
shot me. Not bad — just a little. Here in
the knee. I was in the hospital but when I
came back the commissar wouldn’t let me
go on scouting trips any more. I cried and
cried but the commissar wouldn’t let me
go. I didn’t like that commissar any more.
“After that they gave me new work as a
messenger. But the raids were lots better.
But now I like our division and regiment
very much. It’s a very good division — a
guard division. And Commissar Pavlov
is my very good friend. I like Commissar
Pavlov very much.”
Petya’s eyes were shining again.
“Don’t you have plenty of bombs
around here?” I asked.
Petya’s Horse
This time Petya’s grey eyes were dancing, but his smile was still shy.
“O, yes. I’ve got a horse,” he explained
proudly. “He’s just 3 years old and small
and brown. He’s very good looking and I
call him Rocket. I learned to ride horseback with my regiment. First they used to
send me with a motorcyclist, but then the
roads got too bad for a motorcycle and
then they gave me my own horse.”
“When will you go to school again,
Petya?”
“O, after the war I’ll go to school. There
is no time to take lessons now. We have
to fight.”
“And what would you like to be when
you finish school?”
Petya was giving his answer to Capt.
Emma. He looked at her uniform and the
Commissar’s Red Star on the sleeve of
her overcoat.
“I want to be the same as you,” he said.
“Or perhaps an aviator. I don’t know yet.
If there isn’t any war then I’ll be a peace
aviator so I can make long voyages.”
“Perhaps you’ll fly to America some
day, Petya.”
“Yes, that would be fine — and do
American boys like airplanes, too? …Yes,
I’d like to see America.
“Once I saw an air battle with two
American planes against a Focke-Wulf. It
was right over us and one of the American
planes fired very hard into the Focke-Wulf
and it came down burning and smoking.
We all cheered and yelled for the American plane. I think American planes must
be very good.”
There was silence for awhile and then
Petya wanted to know what kind of money we have in America. I found a dollar
bill in my pocket and asked him to keep it
as a souvenir. When I pointed to George
Washington, he nodded his head quickly
as if he recognized Washington without
any help.
Gift of Tobacco Tin
Now we were back on the main road,
such as it was, and Petya was going back
to his regiment in the truck.
I emptied the last tobacco out of its
round English tin and Petya thought it
had a wonderful odor. He sniffed it deeply and sniffed it again. So I handed him
the tin — in wartime even a tobacco tin
may prove very useful and perhaps he
would like it.
Petya stuck his nose inside the tin to
see if some of the smell was still there.
Then he turned, smiling, to Capt. Emma
and his grey eyes were shining brighter
than ever.
“I am going to give it to the commissar,”
Petya said softly.
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Petya nodded his head vigorously.
“Yesterday we had lots of them,” he said.
“And the day I was riding horseback taking a message to another unit the Fascist sent over many mines. They were
big ones and one exploded very close —
maybe only 100 meters away. I crouched
down over my horse’s neck and how I
made him gallop. We ran away from that
spot very fast.”
114
The Times, October 19, 1942
Hate and Anger
in Russia
INVADER’S BARBARITIES
FROM OUR SPECIAL
CORRESPONDENT
MOSCOW, OCT. 18
A new oath has been introduced into
the Soviet Pioneer Organization to which
some 15,000,000 children aged 10 to 15
belong – “With all my heart,” it runs, “I hate
the Fascist occupants, and will tirelessly
prepare myself for the defence of the Fatherland. I swear, in the name of the warriors who have sacrificed their lives for our
happiness, that I will for ever remember
that my Pioneer necktie and our red banner is stained with their blood.”
The inculcation of hatred as an important part of education for war is all the more
necessary in the Soviet Union because of
the lack of any nationalism or racial pride
in the peacetime curricula. M. Stalin insisted in public statements on the necessity
of hatred of the enemy in the Red Army.
Anger is not enough: the people must burn
with hatred, which inspires violent action
and incredible steadfastness.
There is much evidence in letters and
statements of German prisoners that
the enemy is keenly susceptible to fear
based on the knowledge of the Russians’
hatred for him. This is specially felt during the long nights of winter. “Sometimes
I feel ringed round with implacable hatred
as if in those swamps and forests which
come to the very edge of the villages
thousands of the revengeful enemy are
crouching, waiting to spring,” one wrote;
and this is the tone of many others. It is
difficult for anyone in however comfortable circumstances to pass through the
Russian winter without periods of deep
depression and melancholy, more so for
intruders who see round them the terrible
traces of their own guilt and who have to
meet the accusing eyes of the surly population at every turn. Last winter saw the
German spirit at cracking point and the
demoralization which revealed the craven, hesitant nature of the German in its
true colours. This winter the German spirit
will again be one of the Russians’ principal targets. Deeper in Russia than 12
months ago with a blacker record behind
them, and, it is hoped, an allied lodgment
in Western Europe which will gnaw like a
canker in their brains, the Germans are
unlikely to be less susceptible to fear than
last year.
GERMAN BEASTLINESS
For their part, the Russians are more
deeply moved by hatred now than they
were then. There is scarcely a family that
has not been bereaved or that is not in
fearful doubt of the safety of relatives: and
each day brings further evidence of German beastliness carefully documented
by a Special Commission of the Defence
Commissariat.
Now from the Kuban are coming reports of the terror established in that bountiful and lovely region. Apart from material destruction – the vineyards of Anapa
have been completely destroyed. Armavir
is three-quarters in ruins, Krasnodar is
without water, light, or transport, with little food, and with epidemics sweeping the
city, and hundreds of farmsteads have
been bombed out of recognition – the civil
Daily Boston Globe,
October 21, 1942
This War Gets Very
Personal!
A Very Brave Lady Fights
for Her Life
By NELL GILES
Wendell Willkie and Leland Stowe have
talked the battle of Russia right out of the
remote geography class. Now we know
those generals and soldiers from Hell’s
Elbow, and we’ve seen Joe Stalin smoke
his pipe.
The battle of Stalingrad gets very personal now… as close home as the fight
for her life the lady next door is making
against sly fox named Angina Pectoris. It
isn’t something new, this fight. As the lady
whispered irrelevantly last night, it’s “two
down and one to go.”
Once on a river boat in Russia, a doctor thought she was down for the third
time… But SHE knew the score. It was
Russia she came to see, and no fiend or
pain could stop her. The boat docked and
Mrs. S. was on deck to welcome the smell
and the sound of this enormous land.
That was in 1928, and Mrs. S. was 62
years old. She knew none of the language,
little of the geography, and had never met
a Russian in her life. But her children and
grandchildren were past the apron-string
stage and she’d just inherited an unexpected thousand dollars.
Knew Russia from Study
For years she’d read all she could find
about Russia. She kept a bulletin board
(really only the kitchen door) plastered
with news releases on Russian science,
art and music. She knew the ballets in
Fokine’s mind almost before he did, because they followed the story which, she
knew, too.
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population is being treated with the sickeningly familiar cynicism of their German
invaders. In Krasnodar the hanged may be
seen in the squares.
Kuban women are beautiful, and to
them the German soldiers and their allies
behave with brutish violence. Cossack
vengeance is sharp, and cases have been
known when German officers have been
killed for molesting women, but, except for
sporadic partisan warfare, the Germans
hold the land at their mercy.
116
I was with her that cold night early in
Spring when the Ballet Theatre performed
Fokine’s 70th and last ballet. “The Russian Soldier.” She jumped up to applaud
with tears of pure joy in her eyes. Fokine
had brought her up to date. Prokofieff
touched her heart, and she saw that he
had touched the Boston audience, too. I
knew she wanted to yell, “Let’s send those
Russian soldiers more planes and tanks
and guns,” but just in time she remembered that a Boston lady soon to have a
78th birthday, doesn’t yell, especially not
in evening clothes with white gloves.
Except for this time, I have never seen
her spirits restrained. She welcomed all
new ideas; she listened to every point of
view. To her, all humanity had the flavor
and common sense of the little guy with
the big heart, who lives in China, America,
Russia, Italy, or Egypt. She had God’s-eye
view of the world when the rest of us were
fiercely “made in America.”
How to Keep Youth
Even now, battling against that snapping pain, she doesn’t look a day over 60.
As she’s told me many times, the way to
keep your youth is to dress your age but
act 10 years younger. The world suspects
peroxide on sight ... but not the cattiest
woman alive would suspect an open, unprejudiced mind.
This morning, the doctor sent her to the
hospital, where she will not be allowed to
hold court from a white iron bed, or to boss
the nurse. She left, protesting, on a stretcher, indignant that she was made to appear
infirm before her friends and neighbors. But
none of us could watch her go. Every family
on the fourth floor did their weeping behind
closed doors… and even the Army lieuten-
ant in chemical war-fare is believing that
she’ll walk up those stairs again.
She has given us a new faith in the oldfashioned kind of woman… a grandmother
like Stalingrad, who doesn’t know how to
give in.
The Times, October 21, 1942
The Symbol
Of Stalingrad
OLD LOVE OF COUNTRY AND
NEW ACHIEVEMENT
STERN MEASURES AGAINST
BACKSLIDERS
From Our Diplomatic Correspondent
None of the allies, nor even the Russians themselves, can tell yet how much
they owe to Stalingrad. Some of the evidence is still lacking. How much the battle
has cost Germany, how many Germans
have been killed and maimed, and how
great has been the strain and drain on
German industry and transport – that part
of the ledger is covered. But already the
net gains to the allies are shiningly clear.
The enemy has been forced to spend himself, almost at a standstill, during the two
months which friend and foe alike agreed
in calling the grand climax of the war.
In August the Germans considered
their plans fool-proof. Stalingrad would
fall in a few days, leaving them plenty of
time to launch much larger campaigns,
down against the Caucasus or up against
Moscow before the accursed winter set
in; Russia would be as good as finished,
Europe would be an impenetrable fortress,
A PEOPLE’S DEFENCE
All peoples of the world, even the Germans, acknowledge that never have the
Russian men and boys fought better, never more gloriously, than during these two
months. Their stand may have saved the
war for the allies. They certainly have given Russia time to reorganize her armies
and develop fresh routes for oil to take part
of the load which used to be carried on the
imperilled Volga.
When the full story is told it will probably
reveal that many of the defenders were the
workers of the factories; men who fought
not because they were trained soldiers –
they were trained in their spare time - but
because, while they lived, they were not going to see the Germans take their factories
or come plundering farther into their Soviet
Russia. Even the Germans admit it among
their lies. «We have been held up,» said a
military spokesman the other day, «not by
fortifications, not by generalship, but by the
resistance of the Russian people.»
Many attempts have been made to
explain, or analyse, the Russian fighting
spirit. No one phrase can cover it. To say
that the Russians have always fought well
is as insufficient as to say that they fight
because they believe all property in the
socialist State to be their own. Both statements have to be added together and amplified before the whole truth is anywhere
near.
About the traditional fighting mettle of
the Russian there can be little doubt. Memoirs from the Napoleonic invasions read
poignantly like reports of to-day. There are
Caulaincourt's notes on Borodino: –
The Russians showed the utmost tenacity; when they had to give up their
fieldworks and certain ground, they did so
without disorder. Their ranks did not break;
hammered by our artillery, hacked by our
cavalry, pushed back by our bayonets,
their somewhat slow-moving masses met
death bravely, and only retreated slowly
before the fury of our attacks. These successes, which gave him neither prisoners
nor prizes, made the Emperor discontented. Often he would say to the Prince of
Neuchatel and myself: «These Russians
let themselves be killed like automatons.
They are not taken alive. That's no help to
us in any way. These citadels will have to
be demolished with cannon.»
Automatons? But the Russian at home
is usually abounding with life, emotional,
sensitive to grief and suffering, quick in
responding to happiness. The opposite of
what many say, his mind is vividly individualist: he will explain that he is made up a
little differently from the usual run, really
quite a character, often surprised at himself, and so forth. How, then, comes the
great abnegation of self when it comes
to fighting? In the last war, until the final break, Russian soldiers would come
marching up without arms, confident that
they would equip themselves in the trench-
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and the war would be theirs, except for
the last assault on the British aircraft carrier. The plan was so clear – how could
it go wrong? – that they came to think of
Stalingrad not simply as an obstacle to
be cleared away but as a symbol of victory. The first flames from the white flats
and factories were greeted in the Reich as
beacons proclaiming the quite certain end
of fighting in the cast. Now, instead, it is
another kind of symbol; it is what the Germans call in their hideous phrase a Knochenmühle, a bone mill; a symbol of war
that has engulfed their plans.
118
es by picking up the rifles of those who
had been killed before them.
ABIDING VIRTUES
The inquirer is brought immediately into
touch with the ancient and abiding virtues of
bravery and love of country. Neither is exclusively Russian. The men of Trafalgar and
Waterloo could salute the men of Borodino
and Beresina. The Highlanders at St. Valery
in 1940, the men of the Rawalpindi, the British airmen of a thousand battles, the seamen
of the convoys, can send their greetings to
the defenders of Sevastopol and Stalingrad.
But each people has a quite special kind of
affection for its own country. In the past the
strength and size of Russia seems to have
possessed the people as a mystery; they
were set in the midst of a boundless plain,
a world to itself unchanged for generations,
seemingly tolerant of human activities; and
the mystery and stability of it all convinced
them of the fleetingness of one human life.
Russia would go on no matter what happened to them.
Perhaps more than ever, the Russian
now grows up with a sense of the greatness of his country. Where he has less
of a mystery he has a far greater sense
of personal achievement in the progress;
and with this sense there goes the Slav’s
vivid affection for the particular part of the
country in which he is born. Fewer than
ever of the Russians are disposed to shirk
the answer to Gogol’s question: “What do
you want of me, Russia? What is there between you and me? “
MATERIAL PROGRESS
Courage, love of country, great power of
physical endurance, even the advantages
of geography, are fruitless by themselves
without the hard material means of equipment. Other nations of Europe during the
past three years have had the first three
in abundance and have been overthrown
in less than a month. Nor would the extra
advantage of geography alone have saved
Russia. The men of the Red Army undoubtedly fight with added spirit because they
know of the great material progress which
their country has made during the past 15
years. They have an extra sense of hatred
against the invader who destroys the great
works which their own hands built. But this
progress has also given them the arms
without which all their valour and love of
country would be in vain.
A quarter of their country, formerly the
richest quarter, has gone. But wise strategic planning of industry in Siberia and in the
Urals during the Five-Year Plans – planning
turned to reality by labour on a scale without
precedent and without thought of immediate
human comforts – has brought them a flow
of arms from new factories and new mines
where previously were only steppe and forest. Had the Germans reached the Volga 10
years ago, or even five, Russia would now
be finished in truth. As it is, Hitler’s “marshes,” the parts of Russia which he says
contemptuously he will not invade, contain
the arsenals from which the Red Armies
can fight on with diminished but unbroken
strength. In the last war the lack of railways
for supplies was perhaps the greatest single
handicap from which Russia suffered. During the past 15 years that lack has to a large
extent been made good. This time the Russian soldier has gone to the front equipped.
Through this general fabric there is
laced a strong disciplinary network, both
military and civilian. The Soviet people are
fighting for freedom in a total war; and total
TWENTY YEARS AGO
The tension on the southern front during that sharp German break-through resembled the crisis in the civil war, more
than 20 years ago, when Stalin (still called
Djugashvili by many at that time) descended on besieged Tsaritsin (soon to be called
Stalingrad) and gave the order, “Get rid of
the falterers and nitwits.” Soviet Russia
does not allow its policy to be shaped by
what falterers, nor even by what “the ordi-
nary man,” may be thinking; its war policy
is based on the standard of what the superlatively brave can do. That is both the
high example and the stern measurement.
Lastly, the spirit of Russia at war is
given enormous force and impetus by the
tide of hatred for the invader. It first arose
among the people when they saw with their
eyes the German firing squads and hanging parties; when they saw, or heard, that
civilians were being butchered; when they
realized that their whole country was menaced by the devilish apparatus of modern
German power. Since then Stalin and the
other Soviet leaders have proclaimed the
necessity of hatred. “It is impossible,” Stalin has declared, “to vanquish the enemy
unless you Iearn to hate him with all the
strength of your heart and soul.” Writers
and broadcasters quote German military
pundits of 40 or 50 years ago to prove
how well the present German armies have
learned their lessons. “In 1914 they started to rehearse. They destroyed millions,
but that was not enough for them. Then
they found a worthy leader, Hitler.” In such
a mood, bitter and resolute, the Russian
people greet the defenders of Stalingrad.
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war demands the subordination of all and
everything to the State. To believe that the
tens of thousands of transferred workers
all went to Siberia voluntarily is to misconceive the determination which drives the
Russian leaders and people. Complaints
about the “inconveniences of war” would
find short shrift in Russia at the hour of its
peril. This summer, when the German armies advanced rapidly from Millerovo and
on across the Don, the Soviet newspapers
suggested that the sternest measures
were applied. Commanders who retreated
before orders were given were publicly
named. For example, in Pravda: –
Lieutenant Dmitry Stepanov started to
run. The commander’s cowardice cost us
dearly. Stepanov had forgotten his military
duty. Attempting to save his life, he subjected the lives of his men and the honour of
his country to mortal blows. He did not save
his life. He died a pitiable, shameful death.
Whole regiments were similarly singled
out for public shame: –
This is an example and a reproach to
those who find themselves encircled, or
imagine themselves to be, and passively
lay down their arms, awaiting help from
outside, forgetting their own resources
and losing the will to struggle.
120
The Times, October 28, 1942
Commonwealth of the World
MR. WILLKIE ON U.S.
RESPONSIBILITY
DUTY TO HER ALLIES
Mr. Wendell Willkie, in a broadcast
from New York on Monday night, which
was summarized in the later editions of
The Times yesterday, said that Americans must recognize the responsibility
which they shared with the members of
the British Commonwealth of making the
whole world a Commonwealth of Free
Nations.
In the course of his broadcast, Mr. Willkie said: – We have made great promises.
How have these promises been fulfilled?
The flow of war materials from this country
to some nations I visited is not only small
in itself but compared with the immensity
of this world war we are engaged in it is
tragically small. If I were to tell you how few
bombers China has received from us you
simply would not believe me.
If I were to tell you how far Russia feels
we are not fulfilling our commitments you
would agree with me we have little reason
to boast of our performance. It is up to us
to make our leaders give us more to do.
For I tell you that if we continue to fail to
deliver to our allies what they are entitled
to expect from us, or what we have promised them, our reservoir of good will will
turn into one of resentment.
DEFINING WAR AIMS
We are also punching holes in our reservoir of good will every day by failing to
define clearly our war aims. Besides giving our allies in Asia and in eastern Europe something to fight with we have got
to give them the assurance of what we are
fighting for. Two hundred million people
of Russia and 450,000,000 of China are
bewildered and anxious. They know what
they are fighting for. They are not so sure
of us. Many of them have read the Atlantic Charter. Rightly or wrongly they are not
satisfied. They ask: What about a Pacific
Charter; what about a World Charter?
The people of the East who would like to
court us are doubtful. They cannot ascertain from our Government’s wishy-washy
attitude towards the problem of India what
we are likely to feel at the end of the war
about all the other hundreds of millions of
REMNANTS OF EMPIRE
I am not talking about the Commonwealth of Free Nations. I am talking about
the colonial system wherever it exists, under whatever nation. We Americans are
still too apt to think and speak of the British Empire. We must recognize the truth
that in the vast areas of the world there is
no longer any British Empire, but instead
a proud Commonwealth of Free Nations.
British Colonial possessions are but remnants of the Empire. We must remember
that throughout the Commonwealth there
are men and women numbered by millions
who are working selflessly and with great
skill towards reducing these remnants, extending the Commonwealth in the place
of the colonial system. This it seemed to
me was what General Smuts was talking
about in his recent dramatic speech before
the cheering British Parliament.
As Americans we must also recognize
that we share with these men and women
of the British Commonwealth of Free Nations the responsibility of making the whole
world a Commonwealth of Free Nations.
India is our problem. If Japan should conquer that vast sub-continent we shall be the
losers. In the same sense the Philippines
are a British problem. If we fail to deliver by
force of arms the independence we have
promised to the Filipinos the whole Pacific
world will be the loser. We must believe
these simple truths and speak them loudly
and without fear. Only in this way can the
people of the world forge this strength and
confidence towards each other which we
shall need to win the peace.
ATTITUDE TO ASIA
There are other boles that we are blindly punching in our reservoir of good will
which can be more easily repaired. One of
them is the half-ignorant, half-patronizing
way in which we have grown accustomed
to treating many peoples in eastern Europe and Asia. One of our representatives
to a great Power, for example, although
he has worked for more than 20 years in
the country where he is stationed, has not
troubled to learn the language of the proud
and sensitive people to which he is accredited. On our special missions to Russia, no
one of Cabinet rank has been sent from
this country to talk to Mr. Stalin. It was the
British Prime Minister who primarily spoke
for us on the last such mission. Between
Cairo and Teheran live Arab-speaking
peoples of half a dozen lands with great
traditions and great futures. Yet when I
was there we had in all this area no Minister or Ambassador in residence. We must
wipe out distinction from our minds between “first-class” and “second-class” allies. We must send to represent us among
all our allies really distinguished men who
are important enough, in their own rights
to dare to tell our President the truth.
There is one more leak in our reservoir
of good will which can be plugged by resolute and aggressive action by the people
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Eastern peoples. They cannot tell from our
vague and vacillating talk whether or not
we really do stand for freedom, or what we
mean by freedom. In Africa, in the Middle East and throughout the Arab world,
as well as in China and in the Far East,
freedom means orderly but scheduled abolition of the colonial system. I can assure
you that this is true. I can assure you that
the rule of the people by other peoples is
not freedom and not what we must fight to
preserve.
122
of the democratic nations, and especially
of the United States. It is atrophy of the
intelligence which has been produced by
stupid, arbitrary or undemocratic censorship. It has been suggested much of late,
for example, that private citizens should
refrain from making suggestions with reference to the conduct of the war. This
position threatens to become a tight wall
which will keep truth out and lock misrepresentation and false security within. We
are on the road to winning the war, but we
run a heavy risk of spending far more in
men and materials than we need spend.
This report is based on facts. Such facts
should not be censored. They should be
given to us all. For unless we recognize
and correct them we may lose the friendship of half of our allies before the war is
over, and then lose the peace.
A NEW ASSAULT
The record of this war to date is not
such as to inspire in us any sublime faith
in the infallibility of our military and naval experts. Let us have no more of this
nonsense. Military experts, as well as our
leaders, must be constantly exposed to
democracy’s greatest driving power – the
whip-lash of public opinion developed from
honest and free discussion. For instance,
it was public criticism of the constant failures in North Africa that brought about the
change of command there. When I was in
Egypt that new command stopped Rommel. It has now begun aggressive fighting. I hope our aid in this action will be
adequate and prompt so that Britain and
America will be able to eliminate Rommel
and free North Africa from Axis domination
and begin the assault of the soft spots of
Southern Europe.
I reiterate: we and our allies must establish a second fighting front in Europe.
I also hope that shortly we can put a considerable force in India for aggressive use
in an all-out attack on Burma, as General
Wavell has urged. Thus we shall relieve
the pressure of our enemies on China and
Russia, our superb fighting allies. We must
fight our way through, not only to the destruction of our enemies, but to the new
world idea. We must win the peace. To win
that peace we must plan now for peace on
a world basis; the world must be free economically and politically for nations and for
men that peace may exist in it; and America must play an active, constructive part
in freeing it and keeping its peace. And it
is inescapable that there can be no peace
for any part of the world unless the foundations of peace are made secure throughout all parts of the world.
11.42
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125
The Times, November 4, 1942
Self-Reliance in Russia
FIGHTING SPIRIT
OF THE PEOPLE
From Our Special Correspondent
MOSCOW, Nov. 3
These days before the Soviet Union's
twenty-fifth birthday (November 7) are
marked by intense political activity. Meetings and lectures are taking place everywhere and many questions on the situation are being asked and answered. Russians, both at the front and in the rear, are
told that, although the second front will
undoubtedly be opened - and impressive
figures of British and American strength
are usually quoted - the task of clearing
the German army of occupation out of
their land will remain an essentially Russian task.
«I respect the allies,» writes a popular
feature writer in the Red Army magazine,
and I know that the time will come when
England will get on with the job and American Ships will bring troops to Europe. But
our main hopes rest on the Red Army
and our own strength in this battle of the
people. I believe in the second front – it
is the law of the Red Army to do so – but
. . .,» and here the writer quoted the Rus-
sian equivalent of the proverb, «God helps
them who help themselves.»
While the Soviet people are assured
that the allies will one day be fighting in
Europe, they are being categorically told
that political cliques, often specified, are
delaying the coming of that day. One
prominent speaker stated last week before
a large audience in Moscow that the delay in opening a second front was attributable only to political reasons. He was just
as certain, however, that the British and
American people and their leaders would
succeed in overcoming these handicaps.
THEIR OWN STRENGTH
The mood created by this attitude is
not unsatisfactory from the point of view
of lighting spirit: the people are aware
that they must rely on their own strength
and that it is therefore necessary to exert
it fully.
The Red Army’s gallant light in the
summer and autumn has removed overanxiety about the immediate future. By
diverting the people’s disappointment,
those whose words have an influence on
the masses have prevented one of those
waves of self-reproach and depression
which tend to surge over the Russian people and which are not to be confused with
the trenchant self-criticism which is encouraged by the Communist Party and is
126
the cause of so many scolding articles in
the Press.
The British offensive in Egypt has not
yet made sufficient progress to arouse
much interest here. It is too early to expect
people who, in the past nine months, have
seen several promising advances on their
own front frustrated by the enemy’s defences in depth, to be thrilled by the Eighth
Army’s campaign.
Neither the prospects of success nor
the larger implications are yet discernible, and whatever ground the British have
gained in the Western Desert they have
not gained much yet in the Soviet Press,
which limits its reports to the official an-
tian operations will not be discernible till
the campaign is welt under way. In their
present mood nothing succeeds with the
Russians except success.
Daily Boston Globe,
November 6, 1942
‘Most Always They
Shot Our People in
Front of Everyone in
Village’
By LELAND STOWE
Special Radio to the Boston Globe
(Copyright by the Boston Globe and
Chicago Daily News. Inc.)
WITH THE RED ARMY ON THE
RZHEV FRONT
nouncements from Cairo, printed under
modest headlines.
But this is mainly due to the nature of
the operations. It is realized that in a frontal attack, with infantry preparing the way
for tanks, progress is likely to be slow and
costly. The Russians have similar problems before Leningrad, where manoeuvrability is hampered by forest and lake, just
as General Montgomery is by the sea and
other natural obstacles.
The Soviet attitude towards the Egyp-
It’s all very well to scratch a Russian
and find a tartar, but who’s going to be so
rash as to scratch a tartar? Ivan the Terrible, who must be about as cantankerous and provocative a tartar as ever lived,
seemed to operate on this assumption.
So, of course, during all the time we
remained at Gen. Dmitri Leliushenko’s
headquarters, Ivan neglected to patch up
the gasoline feed line in our car. And that’s
how we dropped in so unexpectedly, about
10 o’clock that night upon Mama Ikaterina
Roubtsova and her two daughters.
It must have been written in the stars,
because we had abandoned our original
route only an hour earlier and were still riding parallel to the front when the car’s engine
“They Shot My Father”
“The Germans came in October and
stayed until Dec. 31,” Antonina said. “They
took all the chickens, pigs and cows, and
they searched every house and took everything they wanted. Look. You see, we’ve
no furniture left. We only got this table after
they had gone. You see, there are only a
few plates in the cupboard — everything
else they smashed or stole. They shot my
father. They killed many people in this village and everywhere in this district.”
Antonina told it without emotion: like
an old story that has been told too many
times. But Galina, with her Ukrainian effervescence, interrupted passionately:
“When I came with those who came back
in January, everybody here met us, sobbing, with tears running down their faces.
Almost everyone had had some member
of the family killed by Germans and almost
everything they owned had been smashed
or stolen. It was terrible. Mama and Antonina were here all the time.”
“I wish we could receive you better,”
said Antonina. Then, in response to our
questions, she told us more.
“One woman, who lived just down the
street, became a partisan. The Germans
killed her. Another young woman — she
was a very good friend of ours — was
locked up by the Germans. I don’t know
what they did to her —she committed suicide with a razor.”
I asked how many civilians the Germans had killed in this neighborhood.
Killed 128 In District
“In this district they killed 128 people,”
Antonina said. “Eighteen of these were
hanged — and most of those killed were
not partisans. They had done nothing at
all. One man, by the name of Tichkin, they
hanged six times. Each time they cut him
down before he was dead — then they
hanged him again. And there was one girl
127
11.42
coughed into supreme silence. We were in
one of those small front-zone villages. Maj.
Arapov went to the first log cabin in sight and
immediately summoned us inside.
A smiling blond young women of about
28 stood at the door. When we stepped
into the cabin’s main room, Mama Roubtsova lay curled up in an iron-posted
bed. She didn’t get up. She just chirped
cheerfully, “Come in, come in.” Two soldiers were also in the room and another
plain-faced young woman wearing a gray
sweater and a blue beret. She was Mama
Roubtsova’s daughter, Antonina, and the
blond woman, we learned, was Galina,
Mama’s daughter-in-law, from Germanoccupied Smolensk.
Antonina and Galina started heating
the samovar for tea and collected all the
chairs in the house so Ilya Ehrenburg,
Maj. Arapov, the two soldiers and myself
could sit down. Meanwhile, Mama Roubtsova rolled over on one side, with her head
cocked up on a pillow so she could hear
everything. She had typically Slavic peasant features: a slightly turned up nose and
plenty of wrinkles, although she didn’t look
much more than 50.
“They didn’t bomb today,” said Mama
Roubtsova from her corner bed. “Probably
because it’s Sunday.”
Then she cackled gayly at the idea that
the Germans would think of sparing people on Sunday. Meanwhile, Ehrenburg and
I were puffing at our pipes and Antonina
was telling us about the Germans when
they took this village.
128
who was a partisan. She kept shouting,
‘Long live Russia.’ They cut off her tongue
before they shot her.”
“That’s true!” exclaimed Mama Roubtsova. “I know people who saw it happen.
Most always the Germans shot our people
in front of everyone in the village. They did
it that way.”
“At Lukovinikovo, the next village, the
Fascists accused a boy of stealing food,”
Antonina continued. “But he ran away.
They hanged his father in front of everyone
and left his body hanging for four days. In
another village they hanged an 8-year-old
boy who had a knife in his pocket; and one
man who had some telephone wire in his
pocket they hanged from a tree in front of
his own house.”
As Antonina and Galina talked, we
learned that Mama Roubtsova’s only son,
Antonina’s brother, had been missing at
the front for many months now. There had
been no word from Antonina’s husband
for six months and Galina’s husband, of
course, was also at the front.
“I don’t think the others will ever come
back.” said Mama Roubtsova in a low
voice. “We shall be three women, alone.”
But Galina was pouring the tea, now,
and Antonina brought in a big pitcher of
milk. “Last Spring we got another cow,”
she explained.
Stowe Decides To Have Party
It was wonderful fresh country milk
— the third time I had tasted milk in 15
months. Then I remembered that bottle of
vodka I had been saving for some special
occasion. If ever there was a special occasion this was it. I pulled out the bottle of
vodka from my knapsack and waved it at
Mama Roubtsova.
The effect upon Mama Roubtsova was
something to remember a lifetime. She
sat bolt upright in bed with a smile that
showed all her guns. Then she hopped
out of bed as spryly as a girl of 20. The
younger women both looked as if Christmas had come and Galina came hurrying
with a glass.
“It’s the only one the Germans didn’t
break,” she said.
So then we drank round-robin fashion
and suddenly this bare room with its one
rag carpet and crude walls, was a warm
and cheerful place.
As we ate our black bread and cheese
Mama showed us photographs of her
dead husband, her missing son and her
daughter’s husband. Then she handed
us a picture of the young woman who had
killed herself with a razor and as she told
what a fine and strong-willed woman she
was Mama Roubtsova almost wept.
“No, Mama,” reproved Galina.”Don’t
cry. You must grit your teeth. We must kill
Germans instead.”
No one else seemed interested in the
milk and I’m afraid I drank whole glasses
of it.
“Today we dug potatoes,” Galina was
saying. “I never did it before. You see, my
husband worked in the bank and we lived
very well. We had everything you could
want to eat: caviar, ice cream, everything.
But now we women do all kinds of work.
Russian women are strong, you know.
If there were no men to fight, we would
fight. Here we stand guard against Nazi
parachutists. If you had come here alone”
(turning to me with a merry laugh) “we’d
have caught you — and very quick.”
Galina had a lively, intelligent face but
suddenly it clouded. “If war hadn’t come
our life would have been so gay,” she said.
It was after in the morning now, and
Mama Roubtsova had pulled out another
mattress from somewhere. She motioned
me toward her bed. I tried to tell Ehrenburg
it was impossible.
“She will feel deeply offended, if you
refuse. You must sleep there,” Ehrenburg
said. Mama Roubtsova curled up with Antonina on one mattress near the side window. She did it as if it was the most natural
thing in the world for a woman past 50 to
get out of her bed and sleep on the floor so
that her guest might be assured a comfortable night.
Galina slept in one tiny bedroom with
her 4-year-old Yura: Ehrenburg slept in a
second little bed-room and six of us slept in
the main room, but I, the American visitor,
was the only one of these who had a bed.
Next morning, before 7, Antonina went
off to the village farm to dig potatoes.
Galina, neat and smiling, departed a few
minutes later to do her turn in the Army telegraph office not far away. Mama Roubtsova and little Yura waved us goodby. Yura
had been sitting in the front seat, with Ivan
the Terrible. We could see that he had an
aching longing for an automobile ride, but
Yura didn’t cry. He stood there on steady
legs and waved, solemn-eyed, Dosvydanya. That was my farewell to the Rzhev
front.
The Times, November 7, 1942
A Day of Celebration
In ordinary times the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Russian revolution would
have carried men’s thoughts back to the
fateful day in November, 1917, when a
129
11.42
“Now all our lives are ruined. They’ll never
be the same.”
And then with a volcanic fierceness she
added: “We must destroy the Germans
once and forever.”
These were the voices of peasant
Russia and these, too, were the people
who are fighting Russia’s war. The kerosene lamp shed a dim, soft glow. The two
soldiers lounged on a mattress on the
floor, near Galina’s chair. Ehrenburg sat
hunched up, near the table, his mass of
long wayward hair making him look for all
the world like a ruffled cockatoo. Antonina
and Galina were laughing zestfully over
some joke and then Galina began to sing.
She sang in a pleasant but strong soprano and as all Ukrainians sing, with her
heart in the song. “Already it is evening.
From the edge of the river Katusha goes
to her home.” And soon the young women, Maj. Arapov and the two soldiers were
singing together.
“It turns, it turns, the blue globe turns.
It turns, it turns, and can’t fall down.
Where is this street? Where is this
house? Where is this maiden whom I
love?”
They sang many Russian songs, and
most of them were gay and the faces of
Galina and Antonina were flushed and
happy. Outside, the guns along the front
still boomed but we didn’t hear them.
I sat listening to the songs and listening to other things which are Russia, which
will never be stamped out. There were no
men living in this log cabin. Perhaps none
of those who had gone away would ever
return here again. Yet, in this simple cabin
were things which Hitler and all his armies
had not destroyed and never could destroy.
“It turns, it turns, the blue globe turns. ...
It can’t fall down.”
130
small band of desperate, enterprising and
far-seeing men set out under LENIN’S leadership to change the face of history. Today when the relentless rhythm of world
war blots out the more leisurely historical
perspective, the mind dwells rather on that
last anniversary a year ago when the first
sweep of HITLER’S invasion was not yet
stayed and Moscow was still under the
threat of his armoured divisions. Even at
that dark moment M. STALIN could speak
with confidence of “the certainty of the defeat of German Fascist imperialism.” The
intervening period, in spite of setbacks and
withdrawals, has confirmed that certainty.
But at no time has certainty been greater,
or confidence more justified, than on this
Russian day of celebration and rejoicing.
“Our country,” said M. STALIN, in opening
his speech yesterday, “has never been so
firm and well organized.” Stalingrad still
stands, as Moscow stood last year, the
pledge and the symbol of Russia’s unbroken and unbreakable resistance; and the
stubbornly triumphant resistance of Stalingrad’s defenders has now been matched,
and to-day’s celebration gladdened, by a
sweeping victory for the United Nations
in Egypt, won this time mainly by British
forces. Much remains to be done, and beyond doubt dark and difficult moments lie
ahead. But it may one day be possible to
remember November 7, 1942, as marking
the point in time when the strategy of the
United Nations passed confidently from
defensive to offensive.
A retrospect of the past twelve months
reveals epoch-making changes in the
shape and aspect of the war. To Britain and
Russia the year has brought a new great
and declared ally, to Britain a new declared
enemy. It has created, in the conception of
the United Nations, a new and world-wide
framework for the combined action of the
free peoples bound together in resistance
to Nazi aggression. It has brought also the
outstanding political achievement of the
twenty years’ treaty of alliance between
Britain and Russia, signed on the occasion of M. MOLOTOV’S visit to this country
last May. By this treaty –”a historic turn in
the relations between ourselves and England,” as M. STALIN called it yesterday
– the two nations stand pledged to work
together in war and in peace, to render
one another the fullest military assistance
in the war and the fullest economic assistance after it, and by their common exertions to lay the foundations of security and
well-being in Europe. During M. MOLOTOV’S visit both the American and British
Governments reached full understanding
with him in regard to the “urgent tasks” of
organization for military action in Europe in
1942. These tasks have not yet been fully
completed. Russian reproaches against a
delay in the time-table, which were freely
echoed in M. STALIN’S speech yesterday,
can be understood, whatever good reasons for delay may have existed, The figures which he gave and his analysis of the
distribution of forces in the last war speak
for themselves. Yet the present victory in
Africa, which has already begun to draw
German reserves of air power and mechanized forces away from behind the Eastern
front, may be fairly regarded as a prelude
to the opening of that “second front in Europe” which must be the ultimate instrument of HITLER’S downfall.
During this eventful year closer contact between Britain and Russia has both
deepened mutual respect and multiplied
points of friction. This has been a perfectly
natural process. For the first time since
1917 British and Russian official circles
understandings of Britain current in Soviet
Russia. Events have dramatically contradicted the belief widely and firmly held in
Soviet circles over a long period that Great
Britain was a predatory capitalist Power
engaged in the pursuit of selfish imperialist aims, irrevocably hostile to Soviet Russia and eager to compound with Fascism
in order to keep her at bay. Had this view
been well founded, Britain would not of
her own free decision and volition have
declared war when HITLER struck eastwards in September, 1939; certainly she
would have had no motive to continue and
intensify the struggle and warmly greet
her new ally when HITLER launched his
second eastern campaign in June, 1941.
Yet the prejudice which underlay these beliefs has no doubt lingered in some quarters, as prejudice always does, long after
the beliefs themselves had been proved
false. It is the same prejudice which today spreads the insidious view that British
and American strategic decisions about
the “second front” are dictated not by military but by political considerations. It is
the same prejudice which, undaunted by
past refutations, is even now instilling into
some Russian minds the subtly false picture of a new imperialism masquerading
in the guise of a partnership of the English- speaking world, bent on making the
world safe for Anglo-Saxon capitalism and
on resuscitating the Versailles policy of the
cordon sanitaire to keep the Bolshevist
monster at arm’s length from the rest of
Europe.
The Russian “die-hards” who cling to
these illusions about British policy may be
as unimportant as their counterparts in this
country who still find Russian policy sinister, irrational, and mischievous. They will
certainly have derived no encouragement
131
11.42
have sincerely and courageously attempted to work together for a great common
purpose. The attempt has thrown the first
beam of light into the gulf of mutual incomprehension which had divided them for a
quarter of a century. It is by bringing these
misunderstandings to the surface, and by
combating the assumption that misunderstandings exist only or predominantly on
one side, that they will at length be dissolved. Hardly anyone in this country will
deny that there have been serious misunderstandings of Soviet Russia on the British side. Prejudice, apart from other obstacles, long stood in the way of any sympathetic approach to the constructive and
epoch- making ideas and achievements of
the revolution of 1917 and of any appreciation of what the rest of the world had to
learn from them: good and bad were alike
rejected or ignored. Prejudice has been responsible for failure to realize, in the words
of MR. EDEN’S message published in Russia in to-day’s issue of the British Ally, “the
moral strength and material power of the
edifice which the people of the U.S.S.R.
have erected in the last twenty-five years.”
Even when HITLER made his treacherous
attack on the Soviet Union the strength
and unity of the Russian national will and
the power and efficiency of the Red Army
to resist the onslaught were long underestimated. These prejudices and doubts,
forgotten here by all but an insignificant
minority, are still remembered in Russia;
and for this reason it is important to demonstrate publicly in this country by word
and deed how completely they belong to
the past. The opportunity to organize an
official British celebration of to-day’s anniversary is one which has apparently been
missed.
But it is also profitable to study the mis-
132
from M. STALIN’S speech with its warm references to the “Anglo-Soviet-American coalition.” But it is one of the tasks of British
statesmanship to remove the last excuses
for their mistrust. The task requires imagination and sympathy; and these primary
qualities are required in all who are called
on to handle Russian affairs at the present
time. The establishment of the closest relations of confidence with the United States
need not, and should not, be allowed to
give ground even for the faintest suspicion
that Soviet Russia is excluded from the
partnership or admitted only as an afterthought or in a subsidiary capacity. In particular, no opportunity should be neglected
of making it clear to the world that Britain
must stand shoulder to shoulder with Russia if the peace and freedom of Europe
are to be established on a secure and impregnable basis. In a speech at Glasgow
last week MR. EDEN deprecated wishful
thinking about the future settlement of the
German problem – of the Germany which
will, as M. STALIN said last night, remain
when HITLER and HITLER’S Germany
have been destroyed. It would be the most
foolhardy of all forms of wishful thinking to
suppose that any settlement could endure,
or could indeed be established, which had
not the whole-hearted cooperation and
concurrence of Soviet Russia. To secure
and maintain cooperation with Russia is
the main and indispensable corner-stone
of British policy in Europe now and in the
future. Those who direct that policy are
certainly not blind to this simple fact. But
to know it is not enough. To proclaim it
boldly and unequivocally is a condition of
that mutual confidence which is required
to make cooperation effective.
The New York Times,
November 7, 1942
Stalin’s Speech on the
War and the Soviet’s
International Relations
MOSCOW, Nov. 6
The complete text of Joseph Stalin’s
address to the Moscow Soviet today follows: Comrades, we celebrate today the
twenty-fifth anniversary of the October
Revolution in our country.
Twenty-five years have passed since
Soviet order was established in our country. We stand now on the threshold of the
twenty-sixth year of existence, of Soviet
existence, of Soviet order. It is the custom
of meetings held in honor of the anniversary of the October Revolution to sum up the
results of the path traversed by the State
and party organizations.
Permit me to present to you a report of
results for the past year, from last November to this November.
Activity of our State and party organization has, in the main, followed two channels — on one hand, in the direction of
peaceful construction and organization
of a strong rear for our fronts and, on the
other hand, in the direction of constructing
defensive and offensive operations by our
Red Army.
The peaceful constructive work of
our leading organizations during this period was expressed in the development
of our industries, both war and civilian, in
the eastern district of our country, in the
evacuation of workers and equipment and
setting them up in new areas; the extension of the sown area and of the Winter
Military operations on the Soviet-German front during the past year can be divided into two periods:
The first was chiefly the Winter period
when the Red Army, having beaten off
German attacks against Moscow, took the
initiative into its hands and went over to the
offensive, driving off the German troops
and, in the space of four months, covering
in some places more than 240 miles.
The second period was the Summer
period when the German Fascist troops,
taking advantage of the absence of a second front in Europe and hurling in their last
reserves, pierced the front in a southwestern direction and took the initiative into
their hands, during five months covering in
some places as much as 350 miles.
Hails Red Army Work
I should like to say that military operations during the first period were especially
successful. Operations of the Red Army in
the areas of Rostov, Tula, Kaluga, before
Mozdok and before Tihkvin and Leningrad
revealed a number of significant facts.
They showed, in the first place, that
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11.42
crop, obtaining radical improvements in
the work of our enterprises working for the
front, and in strengthening labor and discipline in the rear.
It must be said that this was a most difficult and complicated piece of organizational work on big scale for our economic
and administrative organizations, including our railway transport.
However, it was possible to surmount
the difficulties and our factories, collective
and State farms, despite wartime difficulties, undoubtedly are working satisfactorily.
Our war factories and enterprises are
honestly and effectively supplying the Red
Army with guns, mortars, planes, tanks,
machine guns and other arms. Our collective farms and State farms equally are fully
supplying the Red Army with food and our
industry with raw materials, and it can be
said that never before has our country’s
home front been so firmly and strongly organized.
As a result of this glorious organizational and constructional work the people of
our country have learned to act differently
and to become more disciplined, and have
learned to work in military fashion. They
have realized their duty and responsibility
toward their motherland and their defenders at the front, the Red Army.
Idlers and loafers devoid of any sense
of civic duty have become fewer and fewer
in our country. Organized and disciplined
people fully imbued with a sense of civic
duty have become more and more numerous.
The past year has been a year not only
of peaceful construction but at the same
time a year of patriotic war against the
German invaders who treacherously attacked our country.
134
the Red Army and its fighting cadres had
grown into a serious force capable not
only of withstanding the pressure of the
German Fascist troops but also of routing
them in open battle and driving them back.
In the second place, they demonstrated also that the German Fascist troops,
despite all their perseverance, are possessed of serious organic defects which,
given certain favorable conditions for the
Red Army, would lead to their defeat.
It cannot be regarded as accidental that
the German troops who made a triumphant
march through the whole of Europe and
who in one blow defeated French troops
considered to be a first- class army, could
only meet with serious military resistance in
our country. Not only they met resistance,
but also they found themselves compelled
under the blows of the Red Army to retreat
more than 400 kilometers from positions
they had occupied, abandoning on their
road of retreat an immense quantity of
guns, machines and ammunition.
This fact cannot be explained by Winter
conditions of warfare alone.
The second period of hostilities on the
Soviet-German front was marked by terms
in favor of the Germans, by the passing
of the initiative into the hands of the Germans, by the piercing of our front in the
southwestern direction, by the advance of
the German troops and their reaching the
areas of Voronezh, Stalingrad, Novorossiisk, Pyatigorsk and Mozdok.
Taking advantage of the absence of
a second front in Europe, the Germans
and their allies hurled all available reserves to the front and, massing them
in one direction — the southwestern direction — created a large superiority of
forces and achieved substantial tactical
success.
Apparently the Germans are already
not strong enough to conduct an offensive simultaneously in all three directions,
in the south, north and center, as was the
case in the early months of the German
offensive in the Summer of last year, but
they are still strong enough to organize a
serious offensive in some one direction.
What was the principal objective pursued by German Fascist strategists when
they started their Summer offensive on our
front?
To judge by the comment of the foreign press, including the Germans, one
might think the principal objective of the
offensive was to capture the oil districts of
Grozny and Baku, but the facts decidedly
refute this assumption.
The facts show that the German
advance toward the oil districts of the
U.S.S.R. is not their principal objective, but
an auxiliary one.
What, then, was the principal objective
of the German offensive?
It was to outflank Moscow from the east,
to cut it off from the Volga and our rear in
the Urals, and then to strike at Moscow.
The advance of the Germans southward toward the oil districts had an auxiliary purpose which was not only and not
so much to capture the oil district as to
divert our main reserves to the south and
weaken the Moscow front so as to make it
easier to achieve success when striking at
Moscow.
That, in fact, explains why the main
group of German troops is now to be found
not in the south but in the Orel and Stalingrad areas.
Recently a German officer of the German General Staff fell into the hands of
our men.
A map was found on this officer show-
Says Fingers There Burned
Having burned their fingers last year
attempting a frontal blow at Moscow the
Germans, conceived the intention of capturing Moscow this year — this time by an
outflanking movement, and thus ending
the war in the East.
It is with these illusions that they now
are feeding their duped soldiers.
As we know, these calculations of the
Germans also miscarried.
As the result of hunting after two hares
— after oil and after encirclement of Moscow — German strategists landed in a difficult situation.
Thus, the tactical objectives of the German Summer offensive were not consummated, owing to the obvious impossibility
of their strategical plans.
How are we to explain the fact that the
Germans this year were still able to take
the initiative of operations into their hands
and achieve substantial tactical successes
on our front?
It is to be explained by the fact that
the Germans and their allies succeeded
in mustering all their available reserves,
hurling them onto the Eastern Front and
creating a large superiority of forces in one
direction. There can be no doubt that but
for these measures the Germans could not
have achieved any success on our front.
But why were they able to muster all
their reserves and hurl them onto the Eastern Front?
Because the absence of a second front
in Europe enabled them to carry on this
operation without any risk to themselves.
Hence, the chief reason for the tactical
successes of the Germans on our fronts
this year is that the absence of a second
front enabled them to hurl onto our fronts
all their available reserves and create a
large superiority of forces in the southwestern direction.
Let us assume that a second front
existed in Europe as it existed in the first
World War and that a second front diverted — let us say — sixty German divisions
and twenty divisions of Germany’s allies.
What would have been the position of German troops on our front then? It is not difficult to guess that their position would be
deplorable.
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ing the plans and schedule of the German
advance.
From this document it develops that the
Germans intended to be in Borisoglybsk
on July 10, 1942, in Stalingrad July 25,
1942, in Saratov Aug. 10, 1942, in Kuibyshev Aug. 15, 1942, in Arzamas Sept. 10,
1942, and in Baku Sept. 25, 1942.
This document completely confirms our
information to the effect that the principal
aims of the Germans’ Summer offensive
was to outflank Moscow from the east and
to strike at Moscow, while the purpose of
the advance to the south was, apart from
everything else, to divert our reserves
as far as possible from Moscow and to
weaken the Moscow front so as to make it
easier to strike at Moscow.
In short, the principal objective of
the Germans’ Summer offensive was to
surround Moscow and end the war this
year.
In November last year the Germans
reckoned on capturing Moscow by striking a frontal blow and compelling the Red
Army to capitulate, thus achieving the termination of the war in the east. They fed
their soldiers with these illusions.
But this calculation, as we know, miscarried.
136
More than that, it would have been the
end of German Fascist troops for, in that
case, the Red Army would not be where it
is now but somewhere near Pskov, Minsk,
Zhitomir and Odessa.
This means that already in the Summer of this year the German Fascist army
would have been on the verge of disaster
and, if that has not occurred, it is because
the Germans were saved by the absence
of a second front in Europe.
Second Front in World War I
Let us examine the question of a second front in Europe in its historical aspect.
In the first World War Germany had to fight
on two fronts: in the West, chiefly against
Great Britain and France, and in the East
against Russian troops.
Thus, in the first World War, there existed a second front against Germany.
Of 220 divisions which Germany had
then, not more than eighty-five German
divisions were stationed on the Russian
front. If to this we add the troops of Germany’s allies then facing the Russian front
— namely thirty-seven Austro-Hungarian
divisions, two Bulgarian divisions and
three Turkish divisions — we get a total of
127 divisions facing the Russians.
The rest of the divisions of Germany
and her allies were mainly held on the front
against the Anglo-French troops while part
of them performed garrison service in occupied territories of Europe.
Such was the position in the first World
War.
What is the position now in the second
World War? In September of this year, let
us say? According to authenticated information which is beyond all doubt, of the
256 divisions which Germany now has not
less than 179 German divisions are on our
front.
If to this we add twenty-two Rumanian
divisions, fourteen Finnish divisions, ten
Italian divisions, thirteen Hungarian divisions, one Slovak and one Spanish, we
get a total of 240 divisions which are now
fighting on our fronts.
The remaining divisions of Germany
and her allies are performing garrison
service in the occupied countries, while
part of them are fighting in Libya or Egypt
against Great Britain. The Libyan front is
diverting, in all, four German divisions and
eleven Italian divisions.
Hence, instead of the 127 divisions in
the first World War, we are now facing on
our front no less than 240 divisions, and
instead of eighty-five German divisions we
now have 179 German divisions fighting
the Red Army. There you have the chief
reason and the foundation for the tactical
success of the German Fascist troops on
our front in the Summer of this year.
The Germans’ invasion of our country is often compared to Napoleon’s invasion of Russia. But this comparison
will not bear criticism. Of 600,000 troops
which began the campaign against Russia, Napoleon carefully brought 130,000 to
140,000 troops as far as Borodino. That
was all he had at his disposal at Moscow.
Well, we now have over 3,000,000
troops facing the front of the Red Army
and armed with all the implements of modern warfare.
What comparison can there be here?
The German invasion of our country is
also sometimes compared with the Germans’ invasion of Russia of the First World
War. But neither will this comparison bear
criticism.
First, in the First World War there was a
Programs Are Contrasted
It may now be considered indisputable
that in the course of the war imposed upon
the nations by Hitlerite Germany, a radical demarcation of forces and formation
of two opposite camps have taken place
— the camp of the Italo-German coalition
and the camp of the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition. It is equally indisputable that
these two opposing coalitions are guided
by two different and opposite programs of
action. The program of action of the ItaloGerman coalition may be described by the
following points: Racial hatred, domination
of chosen nations, subjugation of other nations and seizure of their territories, economic enslavement of subjugated nations
and spoliation of their national wealth, destruction of democratic liberties, the institution of the Hitlerite regime everywhere.
The program of action of the AngloSoviet-American coalition is:
Abolition of racial exclusiveness. equality of nations and integrity of their territories, liberation of enslaved nations and
restoration of their sovereign rights, the
right of every nation to arrange its affairs
as it wishes, economic aid to nations that
have suffered and assistance to them in
attaining their material welfare, restoration
of democratic liberties, the destruction of
the Hitlerite regime.
The effect of the program of the ItaloGerman coalition has been that all the
occupied countries of Europe — Norway.
Denmark, Belgium, Holland, France,
Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia,
Greece and the occupied regions of the
U.S.S.R. — are burning with hatred of the
Italo-German tyrants, are causing all the
damage they can to the Germans and
their allies and are waiting for a favorable
opportunity to take revenge on their conquerors for the humiliation and violence
they are suffering.
Axis Isolation Is Noted
In this connection one of the characteristic features of the present moment is
the progressively growing isolation of the
Italo-German coalition and the depletion of
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11.42
second front in Europe which rendered the
German positions very difficult, whereas in
this war there is no second front in Europe.
Second, in this war twice as many
troops are facing our front as in the First
World War. Obviously, a comparison is not
appropriate. You can now conceive how
serious and extraordinary are the difficulties confronting the Red Army and how
great is the heroism displayed by the Red
Army in its war of liberation against the
German Fascist troops.
I think that no other country and no
other army could have withstood such
an onslaught of bestial bands of German
Fascist brigands and their allies. Only our
Soviet country and only our Red Army
are capable of withstanding such an onslaught, and not only withstanding it but
overpowering it.
It is often asked, “But will there be
a second front in Europe after all?” Yes,
there will be, sooner or later. There will be
one. And it will be not only because we
need it but, above all, because our Allies
need it no less than we do.
Our allies cannot fail to realize that
since France has been put out of action
the absence of a second front against Fascist Germany may end badly for all freedom-loving countries, including the Allies
themselves.
138
its moral and political reserves in Europe,
its growing weakness and disintegration.
The effect of the program of action of
the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition has
been that all the occupied countries in
Europe are in full sympathy with the members of this coalition and are prepared to
render them all the help of which they are
capable.
In this connection another characteristic feature of the present moment is that
the moral and political reserves of this
coalition are growing from day to day in
Europe, and that this coalition is progressively winning millions of sympathizers
ready to join it in fighting against Hitlerite
tyranny.
If the relative strength of these two coalitions is examined from the standpoint of
human and material resources, one cannot help reaching the conclusion that the
Anglo-Soviet-American coalition has the
indisputable advantage. The question is:
Is this advantage alone sufficient for victory? There are occasions, as we know,
when resources are abundant, but they
are expended so unprofitably that the
advantage is nullified. Obviously, what is
needed in addition to resources is the capacity to mobilize these resources and the
ability to expend them properly.
Is there any reason for doubting the existence of such ability, of such capacity on
the part of the men of the Anglo-SovietAmerican coalition? There are people who
doubt this. But what grounds have they for
their doubts? There was a time when the
men of this coalition displayed their ability
and capacity to mobilize the resources of
their countries and expend them properly
for the purposes of economic, cultural and
political developments.
One asks: What grounds are there for
doubting that the men who have displayed
capacity and ability in mobilizing and distributing resources for economic, cultural
and political purposes will prove incapable
of doing the same things for the purposes
of war?
I think there are no such grounds.
It is said that the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition has every chance of winning
and will certainly win if it did not have one
organic defect which is capable of weakening and disintegrating it.
This defect, in the opinion of these people, is that this coalition consists of heterogeneous elements with different ideologies
and that this circumstance will prevent
their organizing joint action against the
common enemy.
I think this assertion is wrong. It would
be ridiculous to deny the difference in ideologies and social systems of the countries composing the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition. But does this preclude the
possibility and expediency of joint action
on the part of members of this coalition
against the common enemy who holds out
the threat of enslavement for them? It certainly does not.
More that that, the existence of this
threat imperatively imposes the necessity
of joint action upon the members of the coalition in order to save mankind from a reversion to savagery and medieval brutality.
Is not the program of action of the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition a sufficient
basis for the organization of the joint struggle against the Hitlerite tyranny and for the
achievement of victory over it? I think that
it is quite sufficient.
The assumption of these people is also
wrong because of the fact that it is completely refuted by the events of the past
year and, indeed, if these people were
between the U.S.S.R., Great Britain and
the United States of America, who today
are uniting in a fighting alliance against the
Italo-German coalition.
It follows that the logic of things is
stronger than any other logic. There can
be only one conclusion, namely, that the
Anglo-Soviet-American coalition has every chance of vanquishing the Italo-German
coalition, and certainly will vanquish it.
Thus our tasks — the war has torn off
all veils and laid bare all relationships. The
situation has become so clear that nothing is easier than to define our tasks in this
war. In an interview with a Turkisn general
published in the Turkish newspaper Cumhuriyet, that cannibal, Hitler, said:
“We shall destroy Russia so that she
will never be able to rise again.” That
would appear clear although rather silly.
Aim to Destroy Hitlerites
It is not our aim to destroy Germany,
for it is impossible to destory Germany,
just as it is impossible to destroy Russia,
but the Hitlerite State can and should be
destroyed, and our first task, in fact, is to
destroy the Hitlerite State and its inspirers.
In the same interview with the same
general that cannibal, Hitler, went on to
say “we shall continue the war until Russia ceases to have an organized military
force.”
That would appear clear, although illiterate. It is not our aim to destroy all military
force in Germany, for every literate person
will understand that this is not only impossible in regard to Germany, as it is in regard to Russia, but it is also inadvisable
from the point of view of the future. But Hitler’s army can and should be destroyed.
Our second task is, in fact, to destroy
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right we should be observing a progressive mutual alienation of members of the
Anglo-Soviet-American coalition.
Yet far from observing this we have
facts and events pointing to a progressive
rapprochement between the members of
the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition and
their uniting into a single fighting alliance.
The events of the past year supply direct
proof of this.
In July, 1941, several weeks after
Germany attacked the U.S.S.R., Great
Britain concluded with us an agreeemnt
“on joint action in the war against Germany.” Up to that time we had not yet had
an agreement with the United States of
America on this subject.
Ten months later, May 26, 1942, during
Comrade Molotoff’s visit to Great Britain,
the latter concluded with us a treaty of alliance in the war against Hitlerite Germany
and her associates in Europe and of collaboration and mutual assistance thereafter.
This treaty was concluded for a period
of twenty years. It marked a historic turning point in relations between our country
and Great Britain.
In June, 1942, during Comrade Molotoff’s visit to the United States, the United
States of America concluded with us an
agreement on principle applying to mutual
aid in prosecution of the war against aggression, the agreement representing a
substantial advance in relations’ between
the U.S.S.R. and the United States.
Lastly, one should mention so important a fact as the visit to Moscow of
the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Mr.
Churchill, which established complete mutual understanding between the leaders of
the two countries.
There can be no doubt that all these
facts point to progressive rapprochement
140
Hitler’s army and its leaders. The Hitlerite
blackguards have made it a rule to torture
Soviet war prisoners, to flay them by the
hundreds and to condemn thousands of
them to death by starvation.
They outrage and slaughter the civilian
population of occupied territories of our
country, men and women, children and old
folk, our brothers and sisters. They have
made it their aim to enslave or exterminate
the population of the Ukraine, White Russia, the Baltic States, Moldavia, the Crimea and the Caucasus.
Only villians and blackguards, bereft of
all honor and fallen to the level of beasts,
can permit themselves such outrages toward innocent, unarmed people.
But that is not all. They have covered
Europe with gallows and concentration
camps; they have introduced a vile system
of hostages; they shoot and hang absolutely innocent citizens taken as hostages
because some German beast was prevented from violating women or robbing
citizens. They have turned Europe into
a prison of nations, and this they call the
“new order in Europe.”
We know who are the men guilty of
these outrages, the builders of the “new
order in Europe,” all those newly baked
governor generals or just ordinary governors, commandants and sub-commandants. Their names are known to tens of
thousands of tormented peoples. Let these
butchers know that they will not escape
responsibility for their crimes or elude the
avenging hand of tormented nations.
Our third task is to destroy the hated
new order in Europe and to punish its
builders.
Such are our tasks, comrades.
We are waging a great war of liberation. We are not waging it alone, but in
conjunction with our allies. It will end in our
victory over the vile foes of mankind, over
the German Fascist imperialists.
On our standard is inscribed: “Hail the
victory of the Anglo-Soviet-American fighting alliance! Hail the liberation of the nations of Europe from Hitler’s tyranny! Hail
the liberty and independence of our glorious Soviet motherland! Execration and
death to the German fascist invaders, their
State, their army, their new order in Europe!
Glory to our Red Army, glory to our Navy,
glory to the men and women guerrillas!”
The Times, November 10, 1942
America and Russia
The AMERICAN VICE-PRESIDENT’S
speech on Sunday night at a celebration
devoted to the cause of American-Soviet
friendship was a striking pendant to certain passages of M. STALIN’S anniversary
address in Moscow. M. STALIN had bailed
the “Anglo-Soviet-American coalition” and
rejected the notion that “different ideologies” were a bar to joint action against the
common foe. MR. WALLACE believes that
“the new democracy, the democracy of the
common man” towards which the world is
moving will have something to learn both
from American and from Russian ideals.
Not everything that democracy stands for
to-day can be found in the bill of rights.
“Somewhere there is a practical balance
between economic and political democracy; Russia and the United States have
both been working towards this practical
middle ground.” MR. WALLACE cited “ethnic democracy” – equality of opportunity
for different races and groups – “educa-
from China, India, and the Middle East,
into Europe. And in the wake of improved
transportation must come “improved agriculture, industrialization, and rural electrification.”
Such projects may well seem visionary
to an old world immersed in the tradition
of warring nations and age-long political and territorial rivalries. But their broad
sweep and constructive character are well
calculated to appeal to the imagination
of that new world to which both America
and Russia belong. Great Britain, too, has
learned that a far-sighted view of her world
responsibilities is not compatible with detachment from the affairs of Europe. She
has learned at the same time that peace
and order cannot be maintained, in a Europe divided against itself, by any nice balance of a multiplicity of conflicting entities.
Broad and comprehensive solutions of
the kind envisaged by MR. WALLACE will
be as urgently needful in Europe as elsewhere; and Britain, Russia, and the United
States, united in peace as in war, must see
to it that political divisions and traditional
enmities do not stand in the way of what
MR. WALLACE called “the fundamental of
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tional democracy,” and “democracy in the
treatment of sexes” – equal rights and obligations for men and women – as matters
in which Soviet Russia had given a lead.
Internationally the essential quality of MR.
WALLACE’S new democracy is that it must
turn its back on isolationism, with which
Russia, like the United States, has had
“her bitter experience.” It must comprise
“willingness to support world organization,
to maintain world peace by justice implemented by force.”
In his ideas on the complementary
character of American and Russian ideals and on the future of world organization,
MR. WALLACE may well be in advance of
some of his countrymen. But his speech
contained valuable pointers to the line of
closer collaboration both with Soviet Russia and with other countries along which
American thinking and American policies
are most likely to move. When M. STALIN
spoke last week of “economic assistance
to the countries which have suffered and
help to be given them in achieving material welfare,” he was proclaiming not
merely a policy which will enjoy American
sympathy and approval in principle, but
a policy in which Americans of all parties
will feel themselves concerned to participate. The peace which “is supremely interested in raising productivity and therefore
the standard of living of all peoples of the
world” is the only kind of peace which the
American people will in the long run feel
worthy of American ideals, of American resources, and of American effort to sustain
it. In this spirit MR. WALLACE put forward
far-reaching proposals for an international “Tennessee Valley Authority,” and for
a great “combined highway and airway”
from Southern South America to Alaska
and thence across Siberia, with feeders
142
an enduring peace based on the aspirations of the common man.” Thus only can
his conviction be realized that “the American and Russian people,” like the peoples
of Britain and the British Commonwealth,
“will throw their influence on the side of
building a new democracy which will be
the hope of all the world.”
The Times, November 24, 1942
Forward
from Stalingrad
In the mounting allied offensive, which
has begun to determine the course of the
war in both hemispheres, the Russian
armies are already taking a share worthy of their predominant part in the most
recent phases of the defence. The fierce
counter-attack of last week, which administered so severe a repulse to the invaders
of the Caucasus, conveyed a promise of
greater things to come. The next blow has
followed without a pause, and has done
still greater damage to the second of the
two German armies that were principally
charged at the beginning of this year’s
campaign with the task of finally breaking
down the resistance of the Soviet. While
the defeated attackers of Ordzhonikidze
are hastily digging in on the ground they
still hold, MARSHAL TIMOSHENKO has
thrown forward powerful forces in wave after wave of assault from both flanks of the
beleaguered city of Stalingrad. Three days
of furious fighting have proved conclusively which of the adversaries has been
better able to endure the test of physical
and mental resistance that the prodigious
siege of the last four months has imposed.
On both flanks the enemy formations have
broken before the onslaught. A gap twenty
miles wide has been forced to the northwest of the city, in the neighbourhood of
Serafimovich, and one of fifteen miles in
the south; and through these breaches
the Russians have swept forward to a distance of forty or fifty miles.
The losses inflicted are sufficient evidence of the reality of the German defeat.
Last night it was announced from Moscow that 11,000 more prisoners had been
taken, making the total 24,000. Moreover
the direction of the double advance is full
of significance. One of the two attacking
columns has forced its way right through
to Kalach, a town on the banks of the Don
almost due west of Stalingrad. If our Military Correspondent correctly interprets an
ambiguity in the dispatch, and Kalach has
been taken by the forces advancing from
the south, the two main railway lines running towards the Volga from Kharkov and
Krasnodar have both been cut. These are
the principal lines of supply connecting
HOTH’S armies with the railway system
of central Russia and with the Black Sea
ports respectively. At the present season,
just before the winter frost finally closes its
grip on the steppes, road communications
are at their worst. Even, therefore, if the
attack can be held at the points to which
it has at present penetrated, the position
of the German forces still battering at the
town of Stalingrad has now become precarious. The chances of completing the
capture of the fortress this year are by this
time remote, and even if it fell the value
of the ruins to the enemy, now that ice is
already closing the Volga to navigation,
would be infinitesimal. He might attempt to
maintain his forward troops in position and
to supply them through the narrowed neck
shown that this flagging among the helots
may become an increasing factor in the
enemy’s embarrassments. But his own
direct losses are likely to be the greatest
of all. Within the last month he has seen
two Panzer divisions smashed in Africa;
two more have been badly mutilated in the
Caucasus, and now three have come to
grief between the Volga and the Don. This
is a deadly rate of waste. At the same time
it is now known that since the beginning
of the war British and American tanks to
equip twenty divisions have been delivered to Russia; and there is no doubt of
our allies’ ability to man and wield them.
Even if the demands of defence against
the new threat from Africa were not about
to drain Nazi strength, the enemy would
at this date be looking for respite and recuperation on the eastern front. But he is
well aware that Russian strength is being
marshalled at many points of it, and that
the offensive spirit of the Soviet will not
be quenched by winter. It is scarcely too
much to say that, before he has begun
to recover from the Russian campaign of
1942, he has felt the opening blows of the
campaign of 1943.
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of which he still disposes, in the hope of
clinging through the winter to such another
salient as has hitherto held out at Rzhev.
The risks of such a course would be evidently very great; the alternative would be
to confess the total failure of the Stalingrad
enterprise and retreat to the Don.
Prudent generalship would without
doubt choose retreat; the position before
Stalingrad has no longer any strategic
value or prospect commensurate with the
cost of maintaining it and the risk of a major disaster. If HITLER insists on holding on,
he can do so only for the sake of prestige.
In the eyes of the world indeed no prestige
is any longer attainable for the German
army by persisting in the attack on Stalingrad, the failure of which is manifest. The
personal prestige of HITLER in Germany
itself, on the other hand, may be a more
urgent consideration. It can no longer be
maintained without effort. His promise to
reduce the city this year was very precise,
very confident, quite unconditional. His
laboured mockery of his adversaries’ retreats would be likely to rise up disconcertingly against him even in the memory of a
rather humourless people. He may find it
less painful to sacrifice further lives than to
swallow his own words.
Attempts to explain away the latest failure are already being made by German
propaganda. The Rumanians, it appears,
are to be blamed. Although the reports
suggest that the main Russian advance
was made at the expense of German
troops, it would not be surprising if the satellites now began to wilt. Fighting as they
do in the cause of their own enslavement,
they can scarcely be expected to maintain their enthusiasm when their faith in
the invincibility of their master is shaken.
Signals of distress from Italy have already
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The Times, November 28, 1942
The City of Steel
MARSHAL TIMOSHENKO’S offensive
between and beyond the Volga and the
Don is now in its tenth day. Masterly execution has matched audacious conception. Russian tentacles have been plunged
deep into the flanks and, at places, into the
rear of the German forces mustered for the
assault on Stalingrad. It is too early to say
whether the full strategic purpose, which is
no less than the final freeing of Stalingrad
and the destruction by killing or capture of
an army of some 300,000 strung about the
city’s bloody ramparts, will be attained, but
not too early to assess an achievement
already as stimulating and significant as
that of our own Eighth Army. Certain broad
facts are crystal clear. Whatever GOEBBELS may say about the High Command’s
having foreseen all events and provided
against all eventualities, the Red Army’s
blow came as a shattering surprise both in
its scope and in its strength. The Germans
may well have calculated that the Russians would sooner or later try to break
the blockade of Stalingrad. What they did
not calculate – any more than they did at
El Alamein – was the weight of the attack.
The mounting total of prisoners and booty,
greater than in any single Russian operation hitherto, is its own proof of that. It may
also denote a loss of spirit in the rank and
file, especially among the hapless Italians
and Rumanians who do not relish the glory of, as they say, “bearing the brunt.” A
second and not less satisfying fact is that,
notwithstanding their cruel losses and the
watch and ward they are required to maintain over their immense front from the Arc-
tic to the Caucasus, the Russians have yet
been able thus early to mass the men and
materials for a major offensive.
M. STALIN, not HERR HITLER, has decided the fate of Stalingrad. The German
leader has been so consistently wrong in
his appraisement of the new Russia – as
of many other things – that it was hardly
to be supposed that he would prove right
here. Soviet commentators speak of Stalingrad as “the solar plexus of the Union.”
It is that, and more – a symbol of victory.
In the revolutionary struggle of a quarter of
a century ago LENIN sent STALIN to Stalingrad, then Tsaritsin, to hold the Volga
stronghold for the young republic against
the same implacable enemy. STALIN held
it then, as he holds it to-day. History does
repeat itself sometimes. Since the days of
ferment Stalingrad had grown in stature.
It embodied in a special sense the spirit
of the revolutionary struggle; in the years
since the revolution its industrial growth
and thriving communal life embodied the
creative and constructive spirit of the new
regime. This was the token and this the
acid test to which HITLER challenged the
Russians. Little remains of Stalingrad but
its old glory, to which a great defence and
greater deliverance now add new splendour. During the last war it was resolved
to decorate Verdun “for the most gloriously
successful defence in history” – to quote
the terms of the Royal Warrant – with the
British Military Cross: and the same honour was later bestowed on Ypres. The
precedent has been honoured already in
this war in the tribute paid to the courage
and endurance of invincible Malta, and it
would respond to a widely felt sense of
what is fitting and merited, if Stalingrad today were to be offered the dignity of the
George Cross.
parts of the front to the west of Moscow.
These may be no more than diversions
designed to prevent the German High
Command from sending urgent reinforcements to VON HOTH’S army now fighting
for its life in the Stalingrad sack, and even
as such would have more than tactical
importance. It seems probable, however,
that they actually represent a considerable enterprise and that the Red Army is
taking advantage of the stiffening soil in
these water-logged plains to resume an
offensive earlier hogged in the marshes. In
any event they betoken the growing power
of the Red Army now being so fruitfully
displayed in MARSHAL TIMOSHENKO’S
design. M. STALIN, who never speaks
lightly, promised that the time was coming
when the Russians, after having endured
so many of the enemy’s blows, would deliver their own. The first of the blows has
come sooner than the most optimistic foreign observer had hoped, certainly much
sooner than the Germans themselves had
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11.42
The immediate aims of MARSHAL
TIMOSHENKO are evident and ambitious
enough. If they were fully achieved, defeat
might be turned into first-class disaster.
What happened at Rostov last year is an
exhilarating but inadequate comparison.
At heavy cost and much risk the Germans
have pushed their front deeply southward to the Caucasus: it is all they have
to show for their 1942 campaign. They
have travelled far, but not as far as they
had hoped. Baku, Batum, and prizes even
nearer at hand are still beyond their reach.
Their hold on the southern end of their
extended front is none too sure, as the
recent Russian counter-stroke in the Caucasus showed. Full success for MARSHAL
TIMOSHENKO farther north in the Don
bend would do more than shake that hold:
it would disrupt the whole system of supply and defence which the Germans have
built up. The territorial gains of the summer
would be in danger, and a wide withdrawal
of the German front might be imperative,
both to shorten and to secure it. These are
alluring but remoter perspectives. For the
present the development of the battle west
and south of Stalingrad commands attention. There are signs that at some points
resistance is stiffening, but none that the
enemy has either been able to restore on
the spot a situation described by his own
spokesman as “a frightful mix-up” or to
transport to the scene of action the very
large forces which would be required for a
major counter-offensive. The depth of his
embarrassment is indicated by his broadcasts of fairy-tales about the “annihilation”
of Russian formations and units, some of
which are not fighting on this front, while
others do not exist.
There are reports, so far only from hostile sources, of Russian attacks on other
146
expected. Its timing – said to have been
determined by M. STALIN – shows a realistic reading of the strategic situation: for
the offensive was launched just when the
embarrassed Germans were preoccupied
with a redisposition of forces to meet the
acute dangers from the southern front
which the Anglo-American armies have
opened up. The effects of a war on two
fronts, ever the nightmare of German leaders are already making themselves felt.
12.42
12.42
149
The Times, December 8, 1942
Russian Progress
The blows recently struck by the Soviet
armies at various points of their long front
have been so remarkable that bold commentators had already begun to speak
of a threat to recapture Rostov and Smolensk. The Russians themselves rightly
deprecate any such suggestion. The two
great cities stand far beyond the limits to
which the most successful offensive could
be reasonably expected to penetrate
against serious resistance in midwinter;
and to speak of them as possible prizes of
the present advance can only raise false
hopes and lead to corresponding disappointment. This is not to deny that the
need to hold Smolensk and Rostov may
exercise a limiting effect on the German
conduct of the campaign. To permit a Russian advance to Rostov would fatally expose the rear of the army in the Caucasus,
which, having been baulked of its hope of
crossing the passes before the end of autumn, now faces at best an uncomfortable
winter in the field. To uncover Smolensk
would entail the disruption of the enemy’s
whole system of communications on the
central front. He is therefore under the necessity of maintaining armies well to the
east of the two fortresses long after the
advance of the season has robbed them
of their last chance of making any valuable
conquest; and these are the armies that
have become the target of the Russian
counter-offensive. The enemy may not yet
stand in any serious danger of losing Rostov and Smolensk. But he may be compelled to pay, in lives, in material, and in
the reduction of his striking power on other
fronts, a heavy rent for their occupation.
The tactical successes already gained
by the Russians, and the threats overhanging several large bodies of hostile
troops need no reference to remoter strategical possibilities to give them value. The
German army facing Stalingrad is now effectually cut off and surrounded. Parts of
it, no doubt, were swept away with the
general retreat, while some units and formations originally posted on its flanks may
have been swept into the trap with it; the
force within the investment perhaps numbers 120,000 men. The Russian, advance
to the Don has cleared a broad belt some
twenty miles wide between the beleaguered army and the nearest point of the
continuous German line. This belt is not
so densely held as to prevent small bodies of German troops from fighting their
way into or out of the ring; but communications have been decisively cut, and supplies can be sent in only by air. It would be
over-sanguine to expect an early surrender of the German force. It was presumably munitioned for the siege of Stalingrad,
and may be able to continue the fight for a
150
long time, now that it is itself besieged. Its
commander has not yet despaired of his
position so far as to attempt to break out
of the ring to the rear and rejoin the main
army; on the contrary, he is continuing the
attack on the city, though apparently with
flagging power. But his hope of final deliverance must depend on an ultimate recovery of the initiative by the German army on
the Don; and of that there is at present no
sign. The spearheads of the double Russian advance have reached Chepurin on
the lower Don and Parshin on its tributary
the Chir. Any considerable extension of
these salients towards one another would
seriously threaten to complete another ring
round the German forces still remaining on
the left bank of the latter stream.
Similar tactics of encirclement have
placed the enemy in grave difficulties on
the central front. As the result of particularly furious fighting to the west of Rzhev,
in which the enemy has struggled desperately to hold open his remaining lines
of communication, it would seem that the
railway on which this closely beleaguered
salient has so long depended has now
been cut. Farther to the north-west, Velikiye Luki also appears to have been isolated. From the enemy come reports of Russian advances on the Leningrad front, in
the direction of the old Latvian frontier. But
our allies, with their customary caution in
claiming gains while operations are still in
progress, have made no announcement,
and comment may well be postponed until
they are ready to speak.
These notable successes have been
won by the Russians under very difficult
conditions. They are operating in regions
where the communications by road and
rail behind the lines are inferior to those in
the territory held by the Germans. Ice and
snow impose their cramping effect upon
all movement. The grievous diminution
of food resources that they have suffered
through the long retreats of two summers
must by this time be acutely felt, even if
the fighting men can be largely spared, in
the factories that sustain the war effort. Yet
the most remarkable feature of the counter-offensive has been the precision and
accurate timing with which the successive
strokes have been delivered. Between
the lines of the official announcements it
is easy to read the evidence of swift efficiency of movement, and thorough organization of supply, which reflects the highest credit on the commanders and staffs.
If anything, the staff work has improved
upon that of previous campaigns, and testifies to the facility of Russian officers for
learning by experience. The new troops,
who are now being thrown into the battle
in increasing numbers from their training
grounds in Siberia, have lost little time in
proving their mettle, and seem to be of distinctly higher quality than their adversaries.
Positive evidence is naturally not plentiful;
but from the tales of an increasing readiness to surrender, as well as from the patent fact of a setback on a large scale, it
cannot be rash to infer that the spirit of the
present German army in Russia is not that
of the host that so confidently crossed the
frontier in June, 1941. No one in the allied
camp, perhaps few even in the enemy's, is
now likely to doubt the power of the people
and army of Russia to outlast that of the
aggressors, however long the contest may
be drawn out. They have still far to travel
before they have cleared their own soil.
But their superb resistance, and the eagerness with which they pass to the offensive
immediately the pressure is relaxed, give
every ground for confidence that they will
Daily Boston Globe,
December 17, 1942
Stalingrad Made Drive
by Eisenhower
Possible
Stowe Says 400 Nazi Planes
Kept From African Front;
Soviets Using Improved Snow
Equipment, Better Troops;
Offensives Promise Hitler Worse
Winter Than Last One
By LELAND STOWE
Copyrisht, 1942, by the Boston Globe
and Chicago Daily News, Inc.
Leland Stowe, one of the greatest war
correspondents the pres­ent world-wide
struggle has produced, has returned by
air to this coun­try after a prolonged stay
in Russia. His homeward route was by
way of the Middle East and Africa, a front
of particular interest to Ameri­cans since
the landing there of Gen. Ike Eisenhower’s doughboys. Globe readers will recall
Stowe’s previous dispatches from Europe
and India, particularly his sensational expose of the Allies’ failure in Norway which
had a large share in forcing the retirement
of Neville Chamberlain in favor of Winston
Churchill. Mr. Stowe has written several
stories of what he observed on his way
home. This is the first of that stories.
The 250,000 Red Army soldiers who
died to keep Stalingrad out of Hitler’s
hands saved Egypt for the British and
made Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s offensive in North Africa possible.
I brought this point home to a group of
American airmen I had met in an advanced
base on the Libyan desert, a few weeks
after I left Moscow on Nov. 12. These
clean-cut Yankee airmen had had their
baptism of fire over El Alamein and Hellfire
Pass and had contributed their important
bit, helping Gen. Montgomery’s 8th Army
drive Rommel’s Afrika Korps out of Egypt
and hundreds of miles toward points west.
As we lounged in their squadron’s offi­cers
mess tent that night, they told me about
the Allied war battles which had paved the
way and decided the issue.
Leland Stowe Credits Reds
For African Win
Stalingrad Keeps 400 Nazi Planes
From African Front
“What would it have been like if Rommel had had about 400 more planes to put
up against you?” I asked casually.
This chance shot netted a col­lection of
unanimously knitted brows and a circle of
suddenly serious faces. One of Lieut. Col.
Frank Mears’ operations staff of­ficers, Maj.
Archie Knight, obvi­ously spoke for everyone present when he exclaimed: “Four
hun­dred more German planes? Phew! I
even hate to think of it”.
“Do you think you’d be sitting out here
in Libya with the Nazis digging in at El
Agheila if Rommel had had several hundred more planes?” I asked.
“Not on your life. Not a chance!” the answer came in a general chorus.
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12.42
one day play an equally decisive role, in
company with the other United Nations, in
striking the decisive blow at the enemy's
heart.
152
“Well, that’s all I want to know,” I said.
“You’re the fel­lows who are doing the fighting. But if the Russians hadn’t held Stalingrad all through September and October you can bet your flying boots Rommel
would have had at least 300 or 400 more
planes behind El Alamein.”
So far as these American flyers in Libya were concerned there was no need to
press the point. In a flash Stalingrad had
taken on a very personal meaning to them.
There was no telling how many gaps there
would have been in this little circle if the
Red Army had not sacrificed 250,000 men
or more in order to hold Stalingrad if Hitler’s Luftwaffe had not lost hundreds of
airplanes trying again and again to take
Stalingrad.
Russian Offensive to Date Has
Exceeded All Expectations
But now the Russians were on the offensive at last, both around Stalin­grad and
around Rzhev and battling toward Velikie
Luki, and with this the almost inconceivable had hap­pened. No foreign correspondent or military observer in Moscow would
dared predict all this, or more than a tiny
fraction of what the Red Army has accomplished in the past six weeks. They could
not have pre­dicted it because the Russians know how to keep military secrets but if Russian Army commanders did not
know how to keep military secrets some
25 Nazi divisions would not be menaced
with eventual annihilation in front of Stalingrad today.
Accordingly, when I attempt to analyze
the Red Army’s Winter pros­pects, it must
be clearly understood that my observations are not based on any “inside” military information. I do not know any foreign
observers in the Soviet Union, including
mili­tary attaches who possess any really
“inside” information about the Rus­sian
armed forces; much less about the strategic plans of the Russian high command.
Meanwhile, the only advantage which
a correspondent, freshly home from Moscow, possesses accrues from having been
closer to the Russian war effort and from
a somewhat more detailed knowledge of
the weapons, methods and morale of the
Soviet armed forces.
Jolt to German Soldiers’ Morale
Must Be Considerable
My editors ask what undoubtedly you
— the reader — would ask: How far can
these Russian offensives be expected to
go? Whenever and wherever they take the
initiative, how well prepared are the Russians to maintain it? Are the Germans still
very strong along most sectors of the Russian front?
Unquestionably, the Germans still
have very powerful forces on Soviet soil
and large amounts of tanks, planes, guns
and other equipment. The possibility of a
Whole Red Army Trained for Winter
as Never Before
1. Despite the crippling loss of railroad
communications with the Baku oil fields,
of the great coal output of the Don Basin mines, and of industrial centers like
Voroshi­lovgrad and Rostov, the Red Army
has been groomed and girded to the utmost with one all-important ob­jective — to
make Hitler and his in­vading Armies pay
still more heavily for this second Winter
in Russia than they paid for the first. The
Red Army’s officers and men are more
experienced and more skilled than they
were last year. Its lead­ers are determined
to make the utmost use of Nature’s al-
lies, recurrent snow and bitter frost. This
means, beyond doubt that the Russians
will take the offensive between now and
April everywhere they can possibly muster the strength to strike offensively.
2. The whole Red Army has been
trained, equipped and prepared for Winter
fighting as never before. The training of
ski troops has been especially great. It is
impossible to say or to guess, how many
hundreds of thousands of first-class ski
troops the Russians now have; but there
seems no doubt that their number has increased many times over one year ago.
The Russians have motor-sleds to whisk
machine-gunners, or even field pieces
and antitank guns across frozen rivers
and the snow. How many? You guess
again..
They have runners for their air­planes,
and pilots who are far more expert than
the Germans are at handling airplanes
with runners at­tached. They also have
brought large quantities of dog teams
from Siberia, and dogsleds can deliver
munitions much faster than trucks can,
during at least two-thirds of the year In
most parts of Russia.
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12.42
desperate Nazi counter-offensive, either
on the Don or on the central front, cannot
be discounted. Even so, the Red Army has
dealt a staggering blow in the Don elbow
and south of Stalingrad and the jolt to the
German soldiers’ morale must be very
considerable; perhaps even of long-term
conse­quences. Dump the paralyzing Rus­
sian Winter on top of this blow and it may
well be that the fighting spirit of the simonpure Aryan in­vaders will never be quite the
same again.
This is one big reason why the Russians are certain to hit with everything
they can muster through­out this Winter,
but don’t ask me to tell you how far their
present offensive can go. I don’t know and
I don’t know anyone outside of the Red
Army’s high command and the Soviets’
Commissariat of National Defense who
could pretend to know. But there are certain broad aspects of the Russians’ opening Winter campaign which are well worth
con­sidering and here are several which
seem most important to me.
154
3. The Soviet Union has already recovered somewhat from its severe industrial losses in the Ukraine and the Don
Basin. It has probably sur­vived the lowest ebb of its arma­ments production in
many categories, and can look forward to
a considerable increase by Spring. Russian output of planes and tanks, although
still very much below im­mediate needs, is
reported to have risen slowly but steadily in the past few months. Allied planes
and other materials are also arriving at a
quickened tempo and should be greatly
increased once North Africa has been
cleaned up.
But aside from Allied aid, the Soviets
have been winning their production battle
behind the Urals. Once again precise figures are not released or bandied about in
Mos­cow. Nevertheless, the Soviet press
constantly publishes little items which are
highly indicative. The heavy machinery
and special equip­ment which were moved
out of the Ukraine and other areas as the
Nazis drove toward Moscow in 1941 have
long since been re­installed, safely behind
the Ural Mountains, in the Magnitogorsk
or Chelyabinsk areas, or elsewhere in
western central Siberia.
Chimneys are smoking today where
12 months ago pine forests stood in lonely solitude along forgotten Siberian rivers.
There will be many more such chimneys
smok­ing by Spring. In this sense Hit­ler
has lost his opportunity to knock out Soviet Russia before she could radically expand her inner indus­trial citadel.
Daily Boston Globe,
December 18, 1942
Russian Military Power
Higher Than Ever
Before
Losses Heavy, but Army Has
Learned From Mistakes—
New Generals Young
By MAURICE HINDUS
MOSCOW (By “Wireless)
In this-writer’s judgment, Russia, militarily speaking, is much stronger today
than it has ever been during the war.
Russia’s losses have been staggering.
Known facts, directly and indirectly, indicate that since Aug. 15 casualties have
been more than 5,000,000 men killed,
captured or wounded.
The Ukraine-Don-Kuban part of the
north Caucasus — as fertile agricultural
lands as any in the world - are in German
hands. These territories can comfortably
hold several pre-Munich Germanies.
Leningrad is still a military fortress but
no longer the mighty Russian industrial
citadel it once was.
In territory, man power and industrial
energy, Russia’s losses in 18 months have
been prodigious. But that is how it has
always been when Russia fights a largescale war.
The Swedes inflicted a disastrous defeat on Peter the Great at Neva. Afterward,
at Politava, Peter not only vanquished the
Swedish Armies but put an end to the military and territorial ambitions of Charles XII.
In Napoleonic times Russia swallowed
defeat after defeat but was in the end triumphant over an invading French Army.
A New Russia
Three plans, started in 1928, have
given Russia a new mentality, a new skill
and energy. What is equally important is a
new discipline and organization which, in
an emergency, makes it possible to speed
a complete reshuffling of economic and
military resources.
Three plans have taught the Russians
to leave nothing to chance and prepare for
any emergency. This was true in industrialization and collectivization. This was even
more true of mobilization of manpower at
the outbreak of the war.
The Russians have never published the
figures of the millions they have mobilized.
They are a closely guarded military secret.
Premier Josef V. Stalin, speaking at
the 1939 Communist party congress, said
18,500,000 families were on collective
farms. If there is one soldier in each family in this war, we may appreciate Russia’s
manpower.
In industry Russia has accomplished a
miracle — hard won from three industrial
plans.
Russia has developed a technique
in factory building that has enabled her
to evacuate to safer places hundreds of
modern industrial plants and to build hundreds of new factories in eastern, areas,
particularly the Urals.
This much-heard-of but Iittle-known
strip of territory, binding European and
Asiatic Russia, is becoming one of the
industrial regions of the world. From 31
to 93 miles wide and 1550 miles long, it
runs from the Polar Sea almost to the sun
baked desert. It is productive of a wide variety of raw materials. It has become the
backbone of Russian industry and one of
Russia’s important arsenals.
Siberia and Central Asia, likewise, are
becoming dotted with factories. The Russian Stalingrad offensive was possible because of hundreds of new factories built
since the war. _
Neither man power nor industry would
have availed Russia had there not been
a complete shake-up in the army command. Russia now has an essentially
new army born of the errors previously
experienced.
Typical of war criticism is a play now
running, to packed houses - a scathing
indictment of so-called civil war generals.
The civil war generals were largely a
product of the “horse and buggy” days
of the Russian military machine. Prestige, earnestness, political devotion and
a spirit of serf--sacrifice elevated them to
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12.42
Russia, with its vast population and
area, has always had the recuperation
powers for ultimate victory. Invariably the
outside world has underestimated Russia’s immense recuperative capacities.
But never in Russia’s history has the
country so much needed recuperative
powers.
156
positions of high command. But they never
mastered the fighting technique of an advanced machine age. German pincers baffled them. German fortifications stumped
them. A complete change of leadership
was necessary. The authoritative newspaper Red Star on Dec 8 quoted Alexey Tolstoy, one of Russia’s outstanding writers,
as saying — referring to the second period
of the war: “We were then on the defensive, which has served as a shield for the
reorganization of the army.”
New Generals Young
Daring young Russians with knowledge
of machines now command the Army. For
Volga Rivers, new, young generals have
smashed them.
Russia’s weakest link is the agricultural. Unlike factories, wheat lands cannot be
moved. Millions of new acres have been
cultivated, especially in Siberia, but they
do not compensate for the losses in the
Ukraine.
Owing to a rigid national planning, the
Army is abundantly supplied with excellent
food. A general just back from Stalingrad
speaks with enthusiasm of the physical
condition of’ the defending troops.
The civilian population of Stalingrad is
on severe rations. It would be grateful for
fats, sugar and tobacco.
Given a second front in Europe, the
Russian new Army of young, tough generals will give a superb account of itself.
Daily Boston Globe,
December 22, 1942
Leland Stowe Returns
Hitler Knows Deep
Down in His Detestable
Bones He Has Lost
days newspapers have published names
of men elevated to the rank of general —
500 in the last five weeks. Most of the new
generals are in their 30s or 40s.
It was these younger officers who
planned and carried out the Stalingrad offensive, which for the first time since the
war began, has enveloped a large German
force.
Formidable as have been the German
fortifications between the Don and the
By LELAND STOWE
(Copyright, 1942, Bу the Boston Globe
and Chicago Daily News)
Leland Stowe, another of the ranking correspondents of this war whose
dispatches appear in Boston only in the
Globe, is back home after his long assignment in Russia. This is the fourth of his reports to Americans, now that he is free of
cable restrictions.
ADOLF KNOWS НЕ HAS LOST
THE WAR
But if we, on our side, must keep reminding ourselves that all the hardest fighting still lies ahead and that the war isn’t won
yet, you may also bet very safely that Adolf
- deep down in his detestable bones — already knows that he has lost the war. This
new year and this Winter will be the blackest that the former Herr Schickelgruber has
ever known since he took over Germany’s
des­tinies nine years ago.
There is no formula and no prospect
of another blitzkrieg or invasion by Nazi
armed forces which can be sufficiently big
to dumbfound the Allies or to break their
paralyzing, inclosing grip. The “ante” on
Nazi blitzkriegs has gone way up. Both
the risks and the costs are 10 to 20 times
greater than they were six months ago and
in­finitely greater than at any time in 1941.
In less than three years Hitler conquered
almost all of Europe and a very large
slice of Soviet Russia, but now he’s just a
bloated, pot­bellied psuedo-Napoleon with
no place to go — no place to go that’s a
nice, easy, sure-thing place to go to, you
understand.
It’s generally admitted in Russia and
the Middle East that Hitler simply has got
to try something before very long. Those
“fighting fool Russkies” broke Hitler’s nose
at Stalingrad, and are now rubbing it in the
mud west of Rzhev. Gen. Montgomery’s
8th Army smacked Adolf on one cheek by
chasing Rommel deep into Tripolitania,
and the Americans slapped him on the
other cheek in Morocco and Algeria.
So Hitler’s pride and prestige as well as
the body of the Axis armed forces — have
been deeply wounded. How can Hitler retaliate?
There are two things which the Nazi
high command is already try­ing to do.
Their 200-odd divisions inside Soviet Russia are battling desperately in the effort to
slow down the inspired Russians, but with
relatively meager results. Simultaneously,
in Tunisia, the Nazis are attempting to prolong the final phase of the North African
campaign as long as possible.
But neither of these protective, cover-
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At last the time has come in Adolf
Schickelgruber’s career when the real
meaning of Clemenceau’s incompar­able
phrase, “the victor becomes the victim of
his con­quests,” is gnawing ever deeper
into the Fuehrer’s consciousness. The
con­quests of Hitler are beginning to eat his
toes and fingers off. If he hadn’t made that
fatal error of invading Soviet Russia, probably Hitler would have been well on the
way to having the world at his feet today.
Certainly, without Russia’s stupendous
18-month fight, the Allies would have several additional years of war to look forward
to right now — additional, that is, beyond
the very tough job that still lies directly
ahead for another 12 or 24 months or so.
158
up efforts of the Germans is sufficient to
patch up the awful dent in the bridge of
Hit­ler’s nose. The great Nazi conquestimproviser simply must pull an­other conquest out of his hat, and for the first time
it seems horribly difficult for his fingers to
find any­thing solid as they grope, around
in the bottom of that rapidly fading Napoleonic headpiece.
German divisions might occupy Spain;
that’s perhaps the first and most plausible
move. Perhaps they’ll do that almost any
day; regardless of the great difficulties for
railroad transportation in Spain. But the
Germans would still have a tremendous
task ahead of them; the necessity of besieging Gibraltar and the great risks of
attempting to cross the straits into Spanish Morocco with American and British Air
Forces ready.
So if Hitler chooses Spain, he will be
compelled to weaken his gar­rison troops
in France or withdraw urgently needed divisions from Rus­sia; and he will also need
very siz­able air forces—from somewhere.
Yet everything indicates that Ger­many’s
Luftwaffe planes are already spread dangerously thin. What was it that Charles A.
Lindbergh was saying only 18 months ago
about Britain and the United States never
being able to catch up with Ger­many in air
power? Well, if Hitler could have sent even
400 more planes down to Libya in October,
Rommel would never have been driven
out of Egypt at such an undignified pace.
And if Hitler had had even a few hundred
bombers to spare what might have happened to our American troops when they
landed in North Africa?
Aside from Spain (and Portugal), Turkey
will always remain a great temptation to the
Nazi clique. But with the turn of war’s tide in
favor of the Allies, the Turks are now less in-
clined than ever to play the role of Rumania
and Bulgaria. If it ever might have been possible for the Nazis to make a deal with the
Turks, that time has certainly passed. Which
means that Germany today would be forced
to attack Turkey - such a dangerous procedure that it scarcely seems conceivable that
even Hitlerian madness would embark upon
such an adventure.
For Hitler there still remains the repeatedly postponed invasion of the British Isles, but never have his chances of
staging such an in­vasion looked so bleak.
The RAF, buttressed by more and more
American squadrons is stronger than ever
over the channel and Britain’s home defenses have grown to formidable proportions. Unless Hitler wants to end the war in
a gigantic suicidal gesture, he’ won’t try an
invasion of Great Britain this Winter, or in
any foreseeable future.
The Times, December 23, 1942
Russian Victories
The Russian armies on the middle
Don continue to drive the enemy before
them with magnificent dash and fury. In
the conditions of midwinter on the frozen steppe, to advance at all against
the powerful German fortifications is a
remarkable achievement; to advance
seventy-five miles in five days might well
have been accounted impossible, until it
was done. The large number of prisoners
taken, the impressive tale of booty that
has already been counted, expose the
falsity of the automatic German explanation that a voluntary withdrawal is being
made to prepared positions. The Red
great source of supply he will be hard put
to find fuel in 1943 for the tractors of the
Ukraine, on which depended so much of
his plans for provisioning the fortress of
Europe. According to an authoritative estimate, the monthly output of the oilwells
he controls is about a million and a quarter tons, at which figure it about balances
his requirements for the mere routine of
war, so that the heavy demands of every
major offensive are bound to cut into his
reserves. Hence once more the need for
a respite in winter; and hence the value to
the general cause of holding him to lav-
ish expenditure of fuel, as he is held, not
only by such violent battles as each Russian offensive brings about, but also by
the very costly process of supply by carrier aircraft, to which he is reduced for the
maintenance of HOTH’s beleaguered army
before Stalingrad.
The Red Army is, however, doing considerably more than depriving the enemy
of rest and compelling him to draw upon
reserve supplies that will be acutely needed later on. There is something in the Russian strategy which recalls that by which
FOCH wore down and ultimately disinte-
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Army is pressing forward with an air of
conscious superiority over its opponents
born no doubt of the natural exhilaration
that comes to men who have held their
heads high through long months of fighting against odds, and now at last begin
to feel the grim joy of turning successfully to the attack.
The value of this offensive, or rather of
the series of admirably timed movements
of which it forms the latest part, has to be
judged in relation to the whole strategic
situation of the enemy, not only in Russia but on all fronts. In the Nazi system
the winter is always the season for recuperation and the building up of strength,
to be expended in the concentrated assaults of spring and summer. This year
the need for recuperation is redoubled,
first because the strain of the past season has been greater than ever and its
results less, and, secondly, because HITLER knows he must prepare to meet in
the coming year the attack of a far greater and better equipped combination of
his enemies than he has yet faced. His
need to husband his resources is urgent,
almost desperate. Therefore, so long as
the Red Army can keep him fighting at
high pressure in the season he had designed for rest, it is already helping to
win, for all the United Nations, the battles
of next years campaign. Not only are the
men being exhausted who will ultimately
be required for the defence of German
soil; there is now a dangerous drain on
the material resources of the Reich. This
depletion may be especially felt in the
matter of oil. By thwarting one of the main
summer objectives of the enemy, the capture of Baku, the Russians have already
deprived him of much of the value of
his territorial conquests, for without that
160
grated the German army of 1918. Here
is a vast invading army whose prodigious
onrush, intended to carry all before it, has
been stemmed just in time and which is left
in consequence holding a dangerously extended line, full of bulges and irregularities.
The moment when the impetus of such an
army is exhausted is the moment of opportunity for the defence, if it retains sufficient
resilience to exploit it. The Russian commander-in-chief is doing very much what
Foch did. He mounts a vigorous offensive
against a salient or other favourable point
of the German line, penetrating to a considerable depth, or even encircling a large
hostile force. By hard fighting and the
movement of reserves to the threatened
sector the enemy may ultimately restore
equilibrium there; but immediately another
offensive is launched many miles away,
and a second hurried regrouping becomes
necessary. The rhythmic repetition of this
process entails a heavy strain, not only on
the enemy’s troops in the front line, but on
his communications, especially his lateral
communications, in the rear. In Russia it
has not yet gone nearly, so far as it went
in France in 1918; but its cumulative effect
is already shown by the fact that the latest
offensive has penetrated in its first week
considerably farther than its predecessors.
The attack on the middle Don profits, no
doubt, by the fact that the tension at several other points on the front is unrelaxed.
Round Rzhev and Velikiye Luki the armies
remain heavily engaged, and the Russians
are still gaining ground, although resistance has stiffened. Both sides are reticent
about events on the Stalingrad front; but a
fierce battle is certainly proceeding southwest of the city, in which the enemy is expending much effort in the attempt to break
the Russian ring. He has no alternative, for
to desist is to abandon the encircled army
to its fate. Now comes the great drive from
the frozen Don towards the valley of the
Donetz. There are two main thrusts, one
on a broad front driving south-westward,
the other, moving up the valley of the Chir,
which comes in on the left, almost at right
angles to the first, and threatens another
large German force with an encirclement.
The main spearhead of attack points down
the strategically important railway from
Voronezh to Moscow, and its immediate
objective seems to be the considerable
junction at Millerovo, which is in imminent
danger from a two-pronged attack.
On the enemy’s own showing, there is
as yet no abatement in the force of the offensive, which imperils his whole position
in he broad belt of territory between the
Don and the Donetz. This is the corridor
through which runs the supply route by
land to the German army now snowbound
in the Caucasus; and the Russian successes have already narrowed it by half.
At Millerovo they will be within 120 miles
of Rostov. Rostov, the principal seaport
of the region, and the indispensable base
for the whole Caucasus enterprise. It is
too early to think of Rostov itself as a practical Russian objective. Nevertheless the
need to provide for its defence lies near to
the heart of the enemy’s strategic difficulties. His pressing need is to shorten his
line. But he cannot do so by abandoning
the great area within the bend of the Don,
as MARSHAL TIMOSHENKO abandoned
it in the summer, because that would be
to abandon also the army of the Caucasus. He must therefore stand and fight for
every position that he holds; and that is to
play into the Red Army’s hands, provided only the pressure can be maintained
through the still colder months to come.
The Times, December 30, 1942
Tapping Wealth
of Urals
PROCESS HASTENED BY THE
WAR WORKERS FROM WEST
FROM OUR SPECIAL
CORRESPONDENT
MOSCOW, DEC. 29
A highly important article published in
to-day’s Pravda deals with the present
and future situation in the Urals and western Siberia, where pressure of war needs
has hastened the process of industrialization set going by the long-range planning
which was initiated by M. Stalin’s first Fiveyear Plan in 1927.
M. Yemelian Yaroslavsky, a leading
Communist publicist who wrote the article, compares the state of the Urals to-day
with their condition before the Revolution,
when they were an isolated region of low
wages and primitive productive processes. M. Yaroslavsky reveals for the first time
that since the outbreak of war production
in the Urals has increased threefold generally, and in some factories by as much as
seven and a half times.
At Nizhny Tagil expansion has been
300 per cent. This heavy metallurgical
centre in the north Urals to-day presents a
picture of great new factories dwarfing the
old buildings, which cling to the hillsides
and is one of the key points in a region
which since the loss of the Ukraine, Krivoi
Rog, and the Donetz basin has become
the principle arsenal and workshop for the
Red Army in the Soviet Union.
CULTURAL PLANNING
M. Yaroslavsky now appeals for the
adjustment of social and cultural planning
to keep pace with the new situation created by the spurt in the economic life of the
Urals caused by the war. The organization
of life in the Urals he sees as a necessity
and as a responsibility of paramount importance because of the long-range effect
it will have, and he asks that cultural facilities – and in the Soviet Union the term
“culture” covers almost all the amenities
of contemporary life – should be provided
which will eventually bring the standard of
life in the Urals up to those of the cities of
central Russia.
This, he writes, will need more energetic leadership and a broadening of the
mental horizon of local party officials,
the provision of reading rooms, cinemas,
and other local amenities as well as a
resolute tackling of problems of housing, transport, and electric power which
have developed in such cities as Molotov, Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk, Zlatoust,
Magnitogorsk, Serov, and other centres
of swollen population.
EVACUATED WORKERS
This article by so distinguished and authoritative a writer appearing in Pravda at
the close of the year when the Budget is
161
12.42
After the middle of last January the Russian counter-offensives were frozen into
immobility. But this year there is evidence
that our allies are better equipped, better
trained, and more experienced in mechanized war. Their spirit seems to be even
more eager, and high hopes may be entertained.
162
being prepared for 1943 reflects the intention of the Communist Party to speed up
activity in the main industrial region of the
Soviet Union for the benefit of millions of
workers who are only now beginning to
sort themselves out from last year’s vast
evacuation and to pay some attention to
their manner of living. M. Stalin has reported that production is satisfactory. Now has
come the time for an improvement of the
standard of living.
The way in which M. Yaroslavsky envisages the programme is that it should
be part of a plan of reconstruction for the
permanent development of the Urals. He
gives some details of the immense natural
wealth beneath the soil of that 2,500 milelong spine of mountains. Nowhere in the
world has nature been so bountiful.
At present the Soviet Academy of Science, which since the evacuation of Moscow has been established in Sverdlovsk,
has been paying particular attention to the
future exploitation of these riches as well
as to mobilizing them for the present war
effort. Iron ore, copper, nickel, chrome,
manganese, magnesium salts, bauxite,
asbestos, graphite, coal, and oil deposits
are among those discovered recently.
BIG STEPS TAKEN
Already great steps had been taken
under the three Five Year Plans for the development of the riches of the Urals. Under
the third Five Year Plan the coal production in the Urals, for instance, had been
scheduled to be increased over threefold,
and the establishment of a “second Baku”
between the Urals and the Volga had been
an even more ambitious programme. It
had been planned that the Urals steel industry should be independent of Caucasian manganese: in the middle Urals copper and nickel production was planned to
be stepped up considerably.
Reasons of military security prevented
the Soviet Government from announcing
how much progress had been made in
completing the third Five Year Plan programme which was scheduled to end in
1943, but M. Yaroslavsky’s article leaves
no doubt that the Urals part of the programme is ahead of schedule.
Not only have new machinery and labour been pouring into the Urals from
the west, but this labour has represented
a higher average degree of skill than local labour. Gunsmiths of the Urals, electrical workers of Leningrad and Moscow,
and veteran miners of the Ukraine have
brought experience to the Urals.
The Urals have been by no means
without cultural activities this year. Many
theatres from the west have evacuated
there. In Molotov famous ballet and opera
companies from Leningrad have staged
new works. A Ukrainian national theatre
has been established in one city of the
Urals. Many distinguished scientists are
working with their institutions at Sverdlovsk. Schools are functioning normally.
Yaroslavsky’s article envisages a drive
to broaden these activities so that all the
swollen population of the Urals will be adequately provided for.
01.43
01.43
165
The Times, January 2, 1943
REVIEW OF THE YEAR
1942
On the first day of 1942 the representatives of twenty-six countries, many
wholly occupied by the enemy, met in
Washington to pledge themselves to pursue the war against the Axis to the end,
and to make peace on the basis of the
Atlantic Charter. The immediate prospect
was threatening; and the great confederacy of the United Nations was destined
to pass still farther into the shadows in
the ensuing months. Before the year was
out, however, there was to be a clear vision of light ahead; so that it seems likely
that history will judge 1942 to be the year
in which the turning-point of the war was
successfully surmounted.
The Russian counter-offensive, which
had illuminated the gloomy December
of 1941, was brought to an end by the
frosts of January, and left the enemy to
resume his preparations for the spring
campaign, which nevertheless it had notably interrupted. Simultaneously General
Auchinleck’s advance in Libya, though it
went as far as the capture of Benghazi,
petered out before the lines of El Agheila, and was thrown back to Gazala by a
German counter-attack at the end of the
month. The allies therefore had little to
set against the series of heavy disasters
that befell them in the Far East.
The crippling of the American Fleet
at Pearl Harbour, closely followed by the
loss of the British ships Prince of Wales
and Repulse off the Malayan coast, had
left the Japanese masters of the Pacific
Ocean. They exploited their advantage
with ruthless efficiency and speed. With
all the seaways at their disposal they were
able to land troops in the Philippines, and
in the great islands of the Dutch East
Indies, in numbers that were to prove irresistible. Although a magnificent forlorn
hope on the Bataan Peninsula held out
until the beginning of April, both archipelagos were ultimately overwhelmed.
Meanwhile, profiting by the submission of
French Indo-China and the tame surrender of Siam, the Japanese forces swept
down the Malay Peninsula, their command of the sea enabling them constantly
to outflank the British defenders and making it impossible ever to establish a stable
line. The last British troops crossed to the
island of Singapore on January 30. The
great imperial fortress, built for defence
against the sea and un-expectedly finding itself attacked from the landward side,
surrendered unconditionally on February
15-in the same black week in which the
German ships Scharnhorst, Gneisenau,
and Prinz Eugen left their refuge at Brest
and, under the protection of shore-based
aircraft, succeeded in steaming up the
166
English Channel to their home ports in
Germany.
The Japanese did not pause, but
turned at once to attack Burma, while
continuing their offensive against the island of Java, the last stronghold of allied
power in the East Indies. The situation
was exceedingly grave, for the island barrier protecting Australia was being rapidly
penetrated, and the enemy might soon be
expected to appear in force in the Indian
Ocean. On February 27 severe naval
losses were suffered in an action in the
Java Sea - a reverse not fully offset by
a success off New Guinea on March 18;
and on March 12 Great Britain confessed
her weakness in Far Eastern waters by
the evacuation of the Andaman Islands.
The great cities of Burma were successively overrun from the south, and by the
end of April the Japanese were advancing up the Burma Road, hitherto the main
avenue of supply to the Chinese armies.
The Chinese, however, continued to hold
their ground stubbornly against every attack.
The threats now developing were
manifold, and would be multiplied when
spring came to Europe. It was urgently
necessary to buttress Australia, as was
done by the landing, from January onwards, of substantial numbers of American troops, and by the organization of a
joint allied command in this region of the
Pacific. There was constant danger, however, that the communications between
America and Australia would be cut by
the advance of Japanese sea power.
After the fall of Burma the threat to India became immediate, either by a land
invasion of Bengal, or by a seaborne attack on Ceylon. The uneasy political situation there became once more a source
of acute anxiety, and Sir Stafford Cripps
went out on a special mission to the Indian leaders, hoping that, by yet another
confirmation and extension of the assurance of early self-government they had
already received, he might win their full
cooperation with the Government of India. The mission however was wrecked
once more on the rocks of communal intransigence, although the loyalty of India
to the cause of the United Nations was
never in question.
The ominous pattern of the global war
for 1942 was unfolding. Japan was driving with yet unchecked force to the west;
soon Germany would throw her whole
power eastward in a supreme effort to
overwhelm Russian resistance and break
through into Asia. If the two principal enemies were to meet, perhaps in the region of the Persian Gulf, the war would be
prolonged for many years.
With a huge army penned in the British Isles, and now swollen by many thousands of American troops, who had begun
to arrive as early as January, there was
growing popular clamour for some more
visible exertion of British power in the
main theatre of war. It soon took the form
of a demand for the invasion of Northern
Europe, in order to open what was called
“ a second front.” This agitation was
born of a chivalrous eagerness to share
the heavy burden laid mainly on Russia.
But the real key to the situation was the
control of Africa and the Mediterranean,
in which sea the devoted island of Maka
alone kept the British flag flying in what
had become almost an Axis-controlled
lake. The last line of defence against the
threatened junction of the German and
Japanese forces was the series of British positions in the Middle East. Owing to
of naval action, for the main blows were
struck by carrier-borne aircraft, and the
battle fleets, though suffering heavy damage, never came in sight of one another.
The victory almost coincided with the
entry of Japanese war-ships into Manila
harbour; but after it the danger of an invasion of Australia notably receded. An
even more striking American victory in a
battle off Midway Island in June inaugurated the decline of Japanese sea power
and seemed to reduce the enemy’s mobility to a much less dangerous level.
By this time the snow had melted on
the Russian front, and the German forces
were massed for a great onslaught. By a
daring counter-stroke the Russians forestalled the coming attack, and themselves
launched on May 13 a strong offensive
against Kharkov. Although it did not attain that objective, it made considerable
progress, and by disorganizing the enemy’s plan delayed his summer campaign,
and so may well have exercised a farreaching influence on the course of the
war. While it was proceeding the Soviet
Foreign Commissar, M. Molotov, visited
London for important consultations on allied strategy and a far-reaching alliance
was concluded between Great Britain and
the Soviet to last for 20 years and to associate the two Powers in the post-war
settlement of Europe. When the expected
German offensive came, it proved not to
be, as in the previous year, a general advance on the whole front, but to be concentrated on the southern sectors, beginning with the Crimea. Fighting of the utmost intensity raged here throughout the
month of June; for, although the Germans
captured Kerch as early as May 16, the
great fortress of Sevastopol held out with
supreme tenacity, and only surrendered
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the loss of control of the Mediterranean,
these had to be supplied by the long route
round Africa, placing a tremendous strain
on allied shipping, in a year when the German submarine campaign was perhaps
the gravest of the many threats the United
Nations had to meet. In order to set free
a sufficient reserve of naval and carrying
power for any large-scale enterprise in
Europe, it was necessary to reopen the
short Mediterranean route; and this in
turn was dependent upon mastery of the
entire coast of North Africa - where in the
early spring the German general Rommel,
then enjoying an exaggerated reputation,
was mustering his offensive power. The
route round the continent might require
to be safeguarded by the occupation of
Madagascar, which was partially carried
out in May, and completely in September;
but there was no substitute for an attempt
to clear the northern shore.
The prelude to the spring campaign
was an intensification of the attack by
the Royal Air Force on Germany. British
air power was at last able to confront the
enemy on equal terms, and now heavy
blows, which were to increase in power
as the year wore on, began to be delivered uponthe centres of shipbuilding and
munitions manufacture sustaining the
German war effort. In an ostentatious
parade of moral indignation, the enemy
“retaliated” by bombing English cathedral
towns - a measure of barbarity that was
generally regarded as a confession of
declining strength for the achievement of
more military purposes.
In a battle in the Coral Sea lasting
from May 4 to 8, the first severe check
was administered to Japanese aggression, the pace of which was henceforth
notably slowed down. It was a new type
168
on July 1, having won time of inestimable
value.
Meanwhile, in the heat of the North African summer Rommel had assaulted the
British positions covering the approaches
to Egypt. The battle, which lasted a fortnight, was the fiercest yet fought on this
front; and it was early apparent that the
enemy’s equipment was superior, notably in anti-tank artillery, which now for
the first time proved itself the decisive
weapon in desert war. The British tanks
suffered heavy losses on June 13 in the
battle of Knightsbridge and thereafter the
position collapsed. Tobruk, the famous
fortress of the year before, fell almost
without a fight, and General Auchinleck
was compelled to fall back to El Alamein,
within the Egyptian frontier, with Rommel
in hot pursuit, and no very strong hope
of stopping him for long even there. Mussolini himself crossed to Africa, bringing
with him, it is said, the gorgeous uniform
prepared for his state entry into Cairo.
This disaster - the effect of which
could not be undone by the success of
a series of tremendous raids, carried out
with more than 1,000 bombers each, on
centres of German industry - brought to a
head the discontent arising from the long
continuance of adverse fortune. A motion
of no-confidence, moved in the House of
Commons, united the second-front enthusiasts, the advocates of a combined general staff, and other critics, in a general
attack on the Prime Minister and his conduct of the war. Mr. Churchill parried the
thrusts, in spite of being bound to secrecy
in regard to the great and promising enterprises that were even then on the way;
and the vote of censure was overwhelmingly defeated. It was plain, however, that
the strain of waiting for good news was
beginning to tell upon the patience of the
people and the temper of Parliament.
In July the Eighth Army, by determined
resistance, won for itself a precarious respite at El Aiamein. But the German defensive in Russia was sweeping ahead with
alarming momentum towards the river
Don. On the upper reaches of the river
the enemy was held by a resolute Russian defence, pivoting upon a substantial
bridgehead at Voronezh; below that town
it proved impossible to withstand the ferocity of the assault. The Germans having
reached the lower river at a point above
Rostov, the city fell on August 28 and
Marshal Timoshenko determined to withdraw from the whole vast area lying within
the great loop of the Don, and continue
the defence from outside it. This retreat
involved the abandonment of one of the
richest industrial territories in Russia; but
it enabled a new and more tenable defensive line to be constructed. The enemy,
having captured Rostov, hastened to exploit his success in two directions. One
strong army swung right to attack the
passes of the Caucasus, apparently in
the hope of breaking through before winter to the Caspian Sea and the oilfields of
Baku; the other pressed straight forward
to endeavour to cut the chief remaining
lifeline of the Soviet, the River Volga.
Had this been accomplished, the enemy
would have been in a position, by a turning movement to the left, to attack Moscow from the rear, and perhaps to bring
about the collapse of Russian resistance.
But at this point - with Mr. Churchill in colloquy with Stalin in the Kremlin - the Russian resistance buttressed itself upon the
great steel city of Stalingrad, at the point
of the Volga nearest to the Don; and by
the heroic endurance of the garrison and
On the allied side a sense of great
events impending was in the air. In England the approaching mobilization of the
last reserves of man-power for the forces,
and of woman power to replace it in essential civil work, portended that the full
strength of the nation would soon be in
action against the enemy. The phase of
struggle for mere existence was so far
modified that men began to think more
clearly of the future lying beyond the war,
and many inquiries of far-reaching importance were set on foot-plans for the reconstruction of ruined cities, for the use of
land and the location of industry, and, at
the end of the year, a remarkable scheme,
entrusted to Sir William Beveridge, for
guaranteeing social security against the
fear of unemployment and want.
In August the largest republic of the
New World, the United States of Brazil,
her trade intolerably threatened by Axis
piracy, joined the United Nations; and
many South American States, which had
broken off diplomatic relations earlier in
the year, followed her lead and declared
war. From time to time a local operation
by combined forces gave an earnest of
allied offensive power. There were several remarkable raids by the newly formed
“commandos” on the French coast, of
which the most ambitious was that of August 19, when a large formation of allied
troops, mainly Canadians, in cooperation
with the Navy and the R.A.F., and with
full mechanized and armoured equipment, maintained itself ashore at Dieppe
for nine hours. This operation showed the
possibility of invading the Continent and
taught valuable lessons in its organization; the heavy losses, however, gave a
serious warning of the grave difficulties
to be overcome. The alleged ill-treatment
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01.43
people of that fortress, continued over
many weeks, gradually fought the invaders to a standstill.
The success of this epoch-making
defence, entailing as it certainly did the
defeat of the enemy’s main strategical
intentions for the year, marked the autumn of 1942 as the dividing line in the
calendar of the war. Henceforth both
sides became conscious that the initiative of the Axis in grand strategy, which
had lasted three years, was spent at last;
that in the coming period, with allied air
power already markedly superior to that
of the enemy, and the promise of steadily
increasing power from the arsenals of the
New World, the United Nations would be
in a position to attack. This governing fact
was tacitly acknowledged in the speeches of the German leaders, and confessed
in their policy. Their object was now to
organize all Europe as an impregnable
fortress, capable of resisting an indefinite siege until war- weariness or internal dissension should cause the allies to
abandon the attempt to reduce it. To this
end the exploitation of the conquered
territories, as sources of supply of men,
food, and munitions, became ever more
ruthless. Italians, Hungarians, Rumanians, and other vassal nationalities were
herded by thousands to the Russian
front. By a campaign of cruelty and coldblooded murder, for which the history
of crime affords no parallel, an attempt
was made to obliterate the entire Jewish race. Heavier and heavier pressure
was put upon France, ruled since April
by Hitler’s puppet Laval, to enter into
full “collaboration” with the Axis. As a
supreme affirmation of the nature of the
“new order” Hitler in April had proclaimed
himself above the law.
170
of prisoners in the course of the raid
gave the enemy a pretext for putting into
chains a number of the British soldiers
in his hands - a barbarity that was countered by reprisals of the same order. Late
in the year, in response to representations from the Protecting Power, the British Government, which was widely held
to have been betrayed into an error of
judgment, consented to remove the fetters; but the German reply to the Swiss
request, though received in London, has
yet to be made public.
The Dieppe raid evidently looked forward to the tactical needs of 1943. The
task for the remaining months of 1942
was manifestly to close the lines of beleaguerment round the hostile fortress of
Europe. The gap to be closed was the
southern shore of the Mediterranean: it
was time to make a supreme bid for the
total control of Africa. General Smuts,
always “an African in this war,” visited
London in October, and, addressing both
Houses of Parliament, drove home the vital strategic importance of the continent in
which he is the outstanding figure. General Alexander, now in command of the
combined forces in the Middle East, had
been strongly reinforced with men and
the most modem weapons since the defeats of the summer, and on October 23
he launched the Eighth Army to the attack of the Axis positions at El Alamein.
The assault, brilliantly conceived and brilliantly executed, achieved all its objectives; and this time it was no partial victory. The redoubtable Rommel, his tank
formations shattered and thousands of
his men made prisoners, broke into headlong retreat; in hot pursuit General Montgomery chased him out of Egypt, out of
Cyrenaica, and, after a short pause at El
Agheila (the furthest point of previous allied advances), far along the shore of the
Gulf of Sirte towards Tripoli.
Meanwhile a dramatic new move had
transformed the whole African situation.
On November 8, achieving complete strategic surprise, the largest sea convoy in
history had landed an army of British and
American troops at key points of Algiers
and Morocco. With slight resistance the
French garrisons made their submission,
and the two colonies threw in their lot with
the United Nations. The rather equivocal
Admiral Darlan, recently a prominent figure in the “collaborationist” governments
of Vichy, placed himself at the head of
the North African movement (to which the
West African Government at Dakar had
adhered) in favour of the United Nations,
and was accepted as such by the allies not, however, without bitter criticism from
the Fighting French, as the exiles who had
carried on the fight from British soil since
1940 had been renamed in the summer,
when they fused the movement of “Free
France” with the underground resistance
under German rule. The disputed question of Darlan’s bona fides may be left
for history to resolve in a calmer time, for
the admiral was assassinated by a young
Frenchman on Christmas Eve, and was
succeeded by the distinguished General
Giraud, whose high patriotism was beyond dispute.
The response of the Axis to these
events was to man the battlements of the
threatened fortress. The German Army
marched into the unoccupied zone of
France, the French navy at Toulon scuttling their ships rather than surrender
them to the enemy; and the Italians were
permitted to occupy parts of the French
Riviera. At the same time strenuous ef-
German armies at Rostov and in the Caucasus is rapidly being brought into urgent
peril.
In the Far East the first furious onslaught of the Japanese has long since
been stemmed, and is now being slowly
but steadily pressed back. The last hostile advances have been into New Guinea
and the Solomon Islands, in an attempt
to break down the barriers to an invasion
of Australia, or to gain vantage-points on
the line of communication to the Americas. But in the last weeks further American successes at sea have restored to
the United Nations the predominant position in the Solomons, while the Japanese
invading force in New Guinea has been
driven almost into the sea. Meanwhile,
General Wavell, marching from Bengal
over the frontier into Burma, has given by
this preparatory manoeuvre notice that
the allied recovery on the continent of
Asia - supported as it is by some recent
successes of Chinese arms - is about to
begin.
As the New Year opens the circle of
allied power round the European fortress
is nearly complete, and should be ready
to cross the sea, at a point or points concerning which the enemy may be left to
speculate, by the time the campaigning
season begins. In the Far East the balance of power in the Pacific Ocean, on
which all movement depends, has turned
unmistakably against the Japanese. The
train is being laid everywhere for the decisive onslaught. It is likely to lead to the
most terrible lighting that even this war
has yet known-fighting that may be not
only terrible but prolonged. But the tide is
flowing towards victory.
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forts were made to reinforce the strongholds of Bizerta and Tunis, the only points
on African soil that looked capable of a
sustained resistance against the double allied advance from east and west,
and the keys to the control of the Sicilian Narrows, connecting the two basins
of the Mediterranean. Making lavish use
of carrier aircraft, the enemy was able to
establish a respectable garrison in Tunisia; the campaign for its expulsion was incomplete at the end of the year, and may
require the collaboration of the Eighth
Army, now advancing towards Tripoli,
before its success is assured. But for the
last two months the allied air forces, operating from England and Africa, have taken
heavy toll on the Italian lines of communication and in such great industrial centres
as Turin.
The infection of victory had already
spread to the Russian front. On November 20 a severe check was administered
to the German army in the Caucasus,
which has been reduced to immobility
ever since. Two days later an impressive
counter-offensive opened in front of the
battered but invincible city of Stalingrad.
So powerful were the Russian blows that
before long a German army of 200.000
men was completely encircled, and the
belt of Russian territory cutting it off was
steadily increased to a width of 70 miles.
Yet another strong offensive drove in a
large part of the German central front;
and, while the enemy was still taxing his
strength to maintain all the threatened
sectors, the most vigorous thrust of all
was driven into the great area within the
Don bend, which Marshal Timoshenko
had abandoned in August. As the year
ends this mighty movement is still carrying all before it, and the position of the
172
The Times, January 4, 1943
Velikiye Luki
The storming of Velikiye Luki gives as
auspicious a start to the New Year on the
eastern front as the capture of Kotelnikovo gave a glorious finish to the Old. The
principal lines of communication running
through the town had already been cut
by the Russian advance. It was, in fact,
a characteristic specimen of the German
“hedgehogs,” deliberately constructed to
be held, and so to exercise a cramping
influence on the attack, long after the
main line has been forced back on either
side of it. For this purpose its fortifications were probably as strong and its defence as tenacious as any that the Red
Army has encountered; and the main
importance of its capture is to be found
in the evidence it gives of the truly astonishing vitality of the Soviet striking power
as the depth of winter draws near. The
Russian effort on this part of the front is
not exhausted by the conquest of the fortress; the advance is still going forward
towards the railway running south from
Leningrad, one of the main German lines
of lateral communication. The victory of
the week-end may well be the harbinger
of still greater successes to come. But
even by itself, coming so closely upon
the smashing onslaughts on the Don,
which the enemy has not yet begun to
stem, it demonstrates once more the
capacity of the Russians to deliver blow
after blow, first on this part of the front
and then on that, and must depress still
further in the German heart the hope of
that winter respite of which he stands in
such desperate need.
This army, which never pauses for
the completion of one offensive before
launching the next, is the same which
HITLER has repeatedly proclaimed to
have been all but annihilated, and to require not much more than “mopping up.”
He is not the first aspirant to world dominion who has learnt the power of the Russian people, after enduring what might
have seemed crushing military blows, to
send their armies with renewed vigour to
the counter-attack. Through most of the
year 1942 Russia has had to withstand,
unseconded by any major diversion on
the continent of Europe, practically the
entire land and air power of the German
Reich; for what forces HITLER has been
compelled to detach to fight ROMMEL’S
campaign in Africa and to hold down the
subject populations in Europe has been
more than counterbalanced in numbers
by the presence of fifty satellite divisions
on the eastern front. To have undergone
this tremendous attack for so long, and
to be striking back with such fire and fervour at the end of it, is the unique glory
of the Russian people and their army –
secure to them, just as their defiance of
the Luftwaffe in 1940 is to the British. It
fixes upon their allies more firmly than
ever the obligation, which all of them willingly accept, to ensure that in the campaign of the coming year Russia shall no
longer have to bear so disproportionate
a share of the common burden.
In The Spring
HITLER’S New Year messages to
the German Army and people reveal a
much chastened Führer. Gone are the
dazzling prospects; gone, too, the overweening arrogance. Clearly, the old year
has been sobering. That HITLER should
have come to the mood of “To be, or
not to be” is eloquent of the change
of fortunes. Such points deserve to be
noted, but ought not to overshadow the
serious content of his messages. When
HITLER impresses on the armed forces
that more and better weapons are being
forged for the spring he confirms a miscalculation which the Germans made;
but he also discloses a purpose to which
German productive effort is again being
feverishly directed. It is not the first time
that he has talked about new weapons.
In one of his rare speeches in 1942 he
boasted that the German inventive spirit
had not been idle and that his enemies
had better look out. More recently an official of the great Hermann Göring works
said explicitly: “Our new inventions are
a reality, the effects of which we shall
see next spring.” There is no reason
to conjure up from such promises and
predictions the production of weapons
more novel in frightfulness than those
already used by the enemy in this war.
The Germans have been quick not only
to learn but also to apply the lessons
of the fighting on land and sea and in
the air. The references to new weapons
probably mean no more – and, as things
are known to be, it is enough – than that
existing types are being improved and
are being turned out on an abundant
scale.
Yet it may be reasonably doubted
whether performance will or can come
up to HITLER’S promise. For a year all
Germany has been under a strain such
as she has not known before. The industrial effort is no longer undisturbed
as it once was, but is being seriously
disrupted, so that there is diversion of
effort instead of concentration. How
limiting and indeed crippling such diversion can be is seen in the immense improvisation to which the Russian winter
of 1941-42 drove the German war machine. The heavy tax upon the fighting
spirit and the high human cost which the
persistent Russian assaults inexorably
required of the fighting front were aggravated by a totally unforeseen burden
which was felt – it is hardly too much to
say – in every home and every factory
of the distant Reich. Transport, supply,
hospital, and many other services were
suddenly called on to succour, salve,
and secure an army chilled, wasting,
and marooned in bleak, frozen country.
It is cold comfort for the German people
and armed forces to be assured by HITLER that this winter will at any rate not
be worse than the last. This vast diversion of effort, backed by relentless Russian pressure, had certain clear military
consequences. One was that the German offensive of 1942 did not open until
July. Another was that, when it did open,
it embraced, surprisingly, no more than
the section of the front south from Voronezh. The blow was delivered with immense force, but it was less grandiose in
scope and less sustained than it would
have been if HITLER had been blessed
with a milder winter and a quieter front;
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01.43
The Times, January 5, 1943
174
and it failed utterly to bring the desired
decision. HITLER’S own excuse – that
the aim of his summer offensive was no
higher than the interruption of traffic up
the Volga – is a palpable and revealing
falsehood.
The Russian war was in truth HITLER’S Himalayan blunder. Instead of
the clean quick triumph, with the unlimited prestige and loot beyond the dreams
of avarice which it was meant to bring,
it has yielded and is yielding losses almost past reckoning and certainly past
recovery. It presented Germany with
a new and fundamental problem. The
provisioning and maintenance of the
fighting front alone called for a major
effort. It would be folly not to recognize
that in large part the effort was forthcoming. Transport – the key to victory
everywhere – was overburdened; but
it survived, although at the expense of
other enterprises. What could not, and
cannot, be made good is the casualties
in the armed forces. One estimate is
that in the winter of 1941-42 the Russian snows killed or incapacitated as
many Germans as did Russian bullets,
bombs, bayonets, and shells. The earlier practice had been for the army to release skilled men in the winter for work
in the war factories. That convenient
and profitable arrangement no longer
obtains. Instead of men being released
from the front for the factories, men from
the factories have had to make good the
gaps at the front. Yet the need for munitions remains, and – as HITLER himself shows – more pressingly than ever.
Therefore Europe has been scoured for
materials, its workers dragooned by the
press-gang, its factories brought into
the service of the German war machine,
whose maw is insatiable. The measure
of success must not be underrated. The
army of foreign labour now in the Reich
is nearer six millions than five millions.
Since October the flow of skilled labour
from France, subjected as it is to every
form of intimidation as well as mercenary
inducement has shown an increase.
The conquests in Western Russia have
opened still another source of labour.
Many Russian women are being conscribed for domestic service and other
purposes. The Herrenvolk regarding
them as cattle, classifies them for transport as verfrachtet – “sent by freight.” In
the Reich itself the whole industrial system has been geared to greater production. One of the latest innovations is the
“output wage,” the aim of which seems
to be to compel a workman to produce
HITLER’S partner in the 1923 Putsch,
who urgently insisted that only an armistice could save his defeated army from
destruction. The memory of the soundly beaten German army of 1918 is not
one to sustain the spirit of the Germans
fighting in Russia and elsewhere and
HITLER prefers to veil it; but the allies
may draw from these efforts to divert
the gaze of Germany from inconvenient
precedents the assurance that what was
done in that momentous year by skilled,
pertinacious, and valiant battling can
and will be done again in this.
The Times, January 7, 1943
The Flowing Tide
How greatly the present Russian offensive exceeds in power and promise
that of a year ago may be estimated by
a little reflection on the changed feelings with which the friends of Russia
have come to watch the weather reports. The exceptional severity of last
winter was welcomed, first because it
almost halted operations and offered
time for the Soviet armies to make
good, in training and equipment, some
of the handicap under which the aggression of a better prepared enemy
had laid them; and, secondly, because
it was bound to have a weakening effect upon an invading force overtaken
far from home by the intense frosts.
The Russian counterstrokes, before
Moscow, at Taganrog, and elsewhere,
enthusiastically and justly though they
were hailed as evidence of the unbroken spirit of a hard-pressed defence,
175
01.43
more if he wishes to retain such standard of living as he has so far enjoyed.
What has the enemy achieved by all
his exertions, shifts, and stratagems?
His all-important transport system is
working, but only just the destruction
wrought by the R.A.F. on his railways
and locomotives is already much and
will be more the strain of the eastern
campaign and the newly opened Mediterranean front is growing apace. The
food supply is assured, thanks to a not
too bad harvest enriched by the filching
of others produce. Grim and grievous
application of GÖRING’S assurance that
no matter who goes short Germans will
not is shown by independent evidence
of starvation and semi-starvation in
such countries as Greece and Belgium.
There is some reason to believe that
the output of aircraft is again on the upgrade, although it can now never match
Anglo-American production. Much more
important, there is every reason to believe that concentrated industry and ingenuity are going into the swelling construction of U-boats – a fact which can
be neglected only to the dire peril of the
whole allied plan. For the United Nations
the picture is formidable, but neither
discouraging nor surprising. The vast
resources at German command inside
and outside the Reich are waning at a
time when allied resources are waxing.
The human and material wastage of battle is worse than the most cautious German feared. Little wonder that HITLER
and his henchmen harp more than ever
nowadays on 1918. The propagation of
the “stab in the back” fiction is carefully
directed to fortifying the faith of the army
in its own invincibility. In 1918 it was –
as the record attests – LUDENDORFF,
176
seemed little more than an additional
harrying of a foe whose real conqueror
was the weather. This year the climatic
aspect of the battle is almost reversed.
The best we can wish the Russians is
a late and mild winter; for the threat of
a severe season is to halt not a German advance but a Russian pursuit.
At every point in the long front where
there is any movement – and almost
every day some new sector leaps into
intense activity – the Russian columns
are forging ahead. The question asked
everywhere is: “How long dare we hope
that the weather will allow this tide of
victory to flow?”
In the second year of this mighty
struggle better knowledge of the
ground is no longer a sufficient explanation of the superior Russian power
to withstand the rigours of the season
and turn them to account. There is a
contest of the spirit and the will underlying the contest of arms; and in this
too they are steadily establishing their
advantage. Signs may be read that the
imponderable factors of strategy are
moving against the Germans – such
signs as the increasing proportion of
prisoners to other German casualties,
the acknowledgment of shaken confidence contained in G ENERAL S CHERER’S brutal threat to persecute the
families of men who surrender, and the
concealment, which continues, of the
loss of Velikiye Luki from the German
people. The invaders are beginning to
behave like a tired army (which is not
yet a beaten army) – tired perhaps not
only by the exertions and sufferings of
eighteen months’ fighting against an
unbreakable adversary, but also by the
false and feverish emotion stimulated
by ten years of the hysterical Nazi regime. On the other hand the Russian
spirit continues to burn with the steady
flame of patriotism in self-defence, intensified now by righteous indignation,
which becomes more fervent as the
hope of deliverance brightens. Men
moved by such a spirit are the masters of circumstance: and the swifter
and more open the battle becomes, as
it now does on the southern front, the
more their moral superiority is felt.
In attempting to follow operations of
this kind it is very easy to be misled
by the necessary conventions of smallscale maps. To give the map any clear
military meaning, some sort of line has
to be drawn upon it, roughly indicating the frontier between the territories
held by the opposing armies. But this
is done only at the risk of fostering
the illusion that the actual frontier is
a continuous line, stretching without a
break for-hundreds of miles. Every one
is well aware that fighting of that kind
is obsolete, but it needs a constantly
repeated effort to avoid slipping back
and thinking in the old terms. The line
relief offensive from Kotelnikovo all the
arrows have been Russian.
The allies have been watching with
hope and the enemy with anxiety, while
the thrusts denoted by these arrows on
the Don have narrowed the great wedge
of territory which pointed down to the
position of the German advanced forces, baffled of their attempt on Grozny,
in the central Caucasus. This week has
seen the point of the wedge shattered
and the enemy quickly bowing to the
logic of his situation. The brilliant local
action that carried Mozdok has been
quickly followed by a general German
withdrawal. The enemy is fighting with
some vigour as he goes, but it is clear
that his main body is in full retreat, reconciling itself, no doubt, to the loss of
its intended winter quarters in the spa
country, the most comfortable to be
found in Russia. It is possible that he
intends to stand again on the Kuma,
north of Georgievsk: but a continuance
of the retreat to the Kuban or farther
would not be surprising.
The readiness of the enemy to fall
back from these advanced positions in
the Caucasus is certainly related to his
sense of the gathering threat to Rostov, which is the key to his principal
system of communications. The Germans would not indeed be entirely cut
off, even if Rostov fell, since as long as
they hold Tikhoretsk junction they can
bring some supplies across the water
through the port of Yeisk. But this is a
poor alternative; and the third route,
through the Crimea, is hardly an alternative at all, so long as the Russians
maintain their positions close to Novorossiisk. It seems therefore incumbent
on the enemy to make his supreme ef-
177
01.43
on the map of Russia is the kind of line
that a statistician draws to connect up
the isolated points he has plotted on
his graph, and thus to suggest to the
mind, through the eye, a rational connexion between them. But the points,
not the line, are now the fundamentals
of strategy. In the vast spaces now
involved considerable areas, through
which the frontier passes may be unoccupied by either side, but potentially
under the control of one army or the
other according to the proximity of its
strong points of defence. Although to
the west of the line most of the places
of importance may be assumed to be
held by the Germans and to the east
by the Russians, it is not infrequent for
a substantial force of either side to be
maintaining itself well within the territory allotted by the map to the other. If
there are lines that are of primary importance, they are the natural or artificial
lines that govern communications – the
rivers (now, it has to be remembered,
mostly frozen), the, mountain ranges,
and the railways. Along or across these
fixed lines move the columns of attack
to the direct assault or the encirclement of the enemy’s strong points; and
to the mobility and striking-power of
these columns their commander looks
for their security, not, as in other days,
to a lateral extension so great that they
have no flanks. In the battle between
the mobile columns and the strategically passive “hedgehogs” it has been
shown that safety resides in the maintenance of the initiative. For the assistance of the eye, the movement of
the principal columns is indicated on
the map by arrows. It is significant that
since the collapse of the last German
178
fort for the defence of Rostov, as indeed he is already doing. Where the
Russian threat is nearest, he has now
succeeded in slowing down, or even
stopping, the advance along the railway from Millerovo to Likhaya; in this
region he has much the better of the
available rail communications. At the
moment the prospects of the advance
by way of Tatsinskaya are probably
the more hopeful. If Rostov ultimately
falls – which will probably not happen
without a long as well as a hard fight
– it will be the result of the cumulative
threats already apparent from several
directions, and perhaps of some not yet
disclosed. For nothing has been more
admirable in Russian strategy than the
accurate timing which brings one offensive to the reinforcement of another.
The Times, January 29, 1943
Grimmer Days in Reich
ALL EFFORT FOR THE WAR
HOME-WORK FOR THE
WAFFEN S.S.
From Our Diplomatic Correspondent
Goebbels, Hitler's fugleman, is sounding the alarm. The free world notes with
interest his frantic efforts to scare the
German people into accepting still worse
sacrifices, but in the meantime it will not
be diverted from the main task – which
the Casablanca decisions crystallized –
of bringing Germany to «unconditional
surrender» by military action.
What is now being said and written
by Goebbels and others has to be read
in relation to to-morrow's observance
of the tenth anniversary of Hitler's appointment as Chancellor of the Reich.
It has always been a great day in the
Nazi calendar, and Hitler has failed only
once to celebrate it with an address to
the people. This thirtieth of January is
the most momentous of the decade, for
the war he desired and decreed has
gone wrong. That much the High Command acknowledges. Goebbels is now
busily preparing the public itself for a jar
when the Führer speaks to it to-morrow
by means either of a broadcast or of a
proclamation.
There are other things besides Stalingrad and Leningrad to explain. The
High Command is in process of «shortening the front» – a euphemism for miscalculation and failure. In the winter of
1941-42 it also wished to shorten the
line, but was overruled by Hitler, who by
the sheerest fluke just managed not to
land the army into what German writers
have described as a Napoleonic catastrophe. This winter the High Command
has had its way. The German army is
going back under Russian pressure.
The catch phrase Sein oder Schein is
not irrelevant: facts, not intuitions, have
decided the matter this time.
“TOTAL WARRIOR”
The war, the Germans are now being
told, has reached «its grimmest stage»
and demands «a preparedness which
cannot be surpassed by anything.» To
this end every German man from 16 to
65 and every German woman from 17 to
45 is to be mobilized. A spokesman adds
the illuminating touch: «This mobilization
has to be carried out under the mandate
A THIN MARGIN
Curtailment of the production of civilian goods may divert some male labour
to more important war work, but it is
doubtful how deep a cut can be safely
made in this respect. There is evidence
that the authorities are finding difficulty
in providing replacements for householders after an air raid. The margin in
any case is pretty thin, and may even be
perilously thin.
The application of the new “ordinances of total war” is going to provide plenty
of home-work for Himmler’s Waffen S.S.
The bespectacled little butcher has built
up as efficient a gang of thugs as history has known – young, tough, and inspired by his own cold mercilessness.
The S.S. is both the spy and the shield
of the regime. It is likely to be needed
in the grim days on which Germany has
entered, and, if it goes into action, it will
treat Germans with the same brutality
as Russians, Poles, Czechs, and others
have been treated. Hitler will have no
compunction about that.
In assessing the new turn of events
it is essential to bear in mind that the
formidable strength of Germany remains
unbroken and that the measures now
being taken are designed to reinforce it
still more. For the allies the moment is
not one for relaxation or complacency.
It calls, on the contrary, for unremitting
maximum effort so that when the blows
decided on at Casablanca are delivered
they will, combined with Russia’s magnificent assault, shake Hitler’s fortress
to its foundations. But – the cornered rat
fights savagely.
SAUCKEL’S DECREE
The order requiring all German men between 16 and 65 and women from 17 to 45
to register at their local labour exchanges for
national defence work was issued yesterday
by Sauckel, director-general of labour.
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01.43
that he who deserts, flees, or flags will
have to pay for it with his life.» Everybody on the home front has to become
«a total warrior.»
Exactly and statistically what the mobilization means is not certain. Some figures will show the nature of Germany’s
problem. The Army, Navy, Luftwaffe, and
other forces absorb between 9,000,000
and 10,000,000 men – roughly one-third
of the male working population. The two
age groups called up in 1941 and 1942
provided an intake of 1,000,000 men, all
of whom were needed in part replacement of casualties – how large or small
a part is not certain. This year only one
age group of 500,000 men is available.
It may be the new mobilization decree is
designed to fill this gap. If there is to be
another comb-out of the factories it can
be only of skilled men.
It is estimated that about one-half of
German women over 14 are already engaged in essential industries. The other
half includes women with young children,
and in any case the women drawn from
this source are unskilled, whereas Germany needs skilled labour. The actual yield of
the new levy on labour, male and female,
may therefore not be as impressive as the
propaganda that goes with it. Indeed, the
value of the mobilization may be intended
to be psychological rather than practical.
It is significant that the propagandists are
holding up British women as an example
to German women.
180
Men and women already employed,
scholars, clergy, and foreigners are exempt, as well as women with one child
below school age or two children under
14. Women with one child of school age
will be called on to work only if there are
not sufficient wives without children to go
round. Personal wishes about the kind of
work desired will be considered by advice
committees at the labour exchanges, and
individual tests will show in what way the
candidates can best be used for work of
national defence.
“All German men and women,” adds
the decree, “in this world-wide struggle are
to place all their efforts exclusively at the
disposal of the fighting and working community in order to bring about as quickly
as possible the victorious end of the war.”
– Reuter.
02.43
02.43
183
The New York Times,
February 4, 1943
On From Stalingrad
The last remnants of the great Ger­man
garrison at Stalingrad have sur­rendered,
and the Russians are coming back into the
ruins of the city that now lies like a skeleton on the battered banks above the unconquered Volga. Stalingrad is the scene
of the costliest and most stubborn struggle
in this war. The battle fought there to its
desperate finish may turn out to be among
the decisive battles in the long history of
war. But whether or not the record will say
that the fate of the German armies was
sealed when they were turned back from
the Volga, it is cer­tain that in the Russian
legend the story of Stalingrad will be retold and resung for generations to come.
Al­ready it has dwarfed the little battles of
Napoleon. In the scale of its in­tensity, its
destructiveness and its horror, Stalingrad
has no parallel. It engaged the full strength
of the two biggest armies in Europe and
could fit into no lesser framework than that
of a life-and-death conflict which encom­
passes the earth.
From the beginning Stalingrad was for
Stalin and Hitler a test and a sym­bol. The
test of endurance was won by the Russians. As for the symbol, the issue of the
epic duel is indeed a victory for Russia,
perhaps the most glorious and rewarding
in a series of victories. But the Red armies have left Stalingrad 250 miles behind
them. They are pushing very close to the
line where the Germans started the drive
that took them to the Volga. The garrison
at Rostov, the pivot on which the whole
campaign hinges, already hears the guns
of the advancing Russians.
For Germany the symbol spells de­
feat. Stalingrad is the first great mili­tary
disaster the Wehrmacht has suf­fered in
the war. There was retreat last Winter, but
never from a position that Hitler was so
fanatically deter­mined to hold. Three days
of national mourning have been ordered in
Ger­many, and this wallowing in grief ex­
presses more than sorrow for a lost I battle or even for the regiments left to perish
there. It signifies the failure of Hitler’s costliest gamble with the blood and patrimony
of the Reich, and in the strange, twisted
interplay of disinte­grating forces going on
behind the scenes, it may even be intended
to un­derline Hitler’s responsibility.
In any case the dirges and the period of mourning write the obituary for
any hopes the German people may have
cherished of compensation in Russia for
the inhuman sacrifices they have to Hitler’s ambition. The Rus­sians estimate that
since mid-Novem­ber the advance and retreat from Sta­lingrad have cost the enemy
500,000 troops. What are the Germans
think­ing today of the leader who paid this
price for nothing?
184
Daily Boston Globe,
February 7, 1943
Russia as Maurice
Hindus Saw It
Soviet Victories Bought at Cost
of 10,000,000 Lives
(This is the first of a series of articles
by Maurice Hindus, special Boston GlobeNew York Herald Tribune correspondent,
who has just returned from a seven-month
tour of Russia.)
By MAURICE HINDUS
(Copyright. 1943. Boston Globe and
New York Tribune, Inc.)
“Tell America,” said a Russian colonel
whom I was bidding farewell, “not to pat us
so much on the back.”
“But,” I said, “America appreciates the
heroism of the Red Army.”
“Yes,” he said, “but think of the price
we are paying. I had two brothers. One
is dead. From the other I haven’t heard
in three months — a bad sign. My wife
and child saved themselves and are now
in Novosibirsk. But my poor-father and
mother remained in occupied territory. In
all likelihood they are dead because of me,
a son, who is a colonel in the Red Army.”
Hardly a Russian I went to see before
leaving Moscow but spoke in a similar
vein. Happy as Russians are over their
present victories, they are acutely aware
that the fighting is on Russian soil, that
it is Russian towns, villages and cities
which are being devastated. Not for a
single moment do they forget the stupendous price they are paying. Too many, too
constant, too poignant are the personal
reminders,especially when they come
home from work; They cannot escape the
photographs on the walls of a father, a
son, a husband, a brother who will never
return.
Few Wear Mourning
Few Russians wear mourning. There is
no law against it. When there is so much
bereavement in the country, there is no
use showing it in public. That also is why
there are seldom public funerals. I did not
see one in Moscow in all the time I was
there. But if people did wear mourning in
the capital or in Leningrad, the streets and
public squares would be black.
“Rzhev,” I heard an officer say, “is a
slaughterhouse. We are killing plenty of
Germans, but they are killing lots of our
men — the flower of our youth.”
It is not only in Rzhev that the flower of
Russia’s youth is perishing, and Russians
know it only too well. Russia is a land of
young widows; there are millions of them.
There are even more millions of orphans.
It is safe to assert that no less than
4,000,000 Russians have already lost
their lives in the fighting. But this is the
Two Hanged for Fleeing
One night two Russians attempted to
escape. They were captured and hanged
in front of the barn. For three weeks, in
wind and snow, the frozen bodies swung
from the gallows. I was in this village, and
eyewitnesses who told me this story said
they had never seen anything more grewsome.
There were hundreds of such barns in
the German-held lands. War prisoners and
others lived, hungered, died, in crowds. No
one knows how many millions of Russians
have died prematurely in conquered territory. The estimates run from 10,000,000
to 15,000,000. But even if we lower it to
6,000,000 Russia has already lost at least
10,000,00 lives.
The population of America is about
three-fourths that of Russia in 1939. The
reader can imagine what the condition
of American homes and the mood of the
American people would be had we suffered a proportionate loss of life — that is,
between 7,000,000 and 8,000,000.
With so many millions already sacrificed in the war, not merely against Fascism but, against Germans, junkers, as
well as peasants and workers, Russians
feel their losses too deeply to derive consolation from the plaudits of the outside
world. It is significant that the Russian
press gives little space to these plaudits.
Wherever one turns in Russia, one becomes acutely aware of the tremendous
sacrifices the people are making. The fact
that they are enduring these sacrifices with
fortitude does not mitigate their severity.
Compared with what they used to
be, the shops are practically empty. The
only things which Moscow stores seem
to carry in abundance are children’s toys
and men’s ties. But neither of these commodities is of recent manufacture. Since
about half of Moscow’s children have been
evacuated and more than half the men are
at war, the pre-war supply of toys and ties
remains unexhausted.
Candles Are Useful
Candles are very useful in a county at war. I had neglected to bring any
with me, so on my arrival in Moscow I
went shopping for candles. After visiting a dozen stores I gave up the search.
There were no candies for sale; at least
I could not find any. Only church people
are permitted to buy candles freely, not
for home use but for religious purposes.
I was astonished at the hundreds of lighted candles I saw at the services in the
Moscow Cathedral.
New shoes and new clothes are im-
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02.43
smaller part of the casualties the Russians
have suffered. By far the greater number
of deaths has occurred in the Germanheld territories.
In a village which the Germans controlled for 10 months there is an old peasant
barn built of timber with a low-hanging
thatch roof which tells a shattering story.
In the dead of Winter the Germans drove
into this barn several hundred Russian
war prisoners. Despite the bitter cold there
was no heat in the barn, not a single wood
stove. Nor did the Russians have warm
clothes. The Germans stripped them of the
felts, woolens and sheepskins they wore
when they were captured. Exposed to cold
and wretchedly fed — one bowl of grainless soup and one slice of bread a day —
they died by the score of pneumonia and
other diseases.
186
possible to buy. Fortunately Russians are
a thrifty people and now how to conserve
and preserve clothes. When Winter came,
Muscovites were comfortably clad — but
in old clothes. If a Russian wants to fix a
pair of shoes, he usually uses the leather
from a shoe that is no longer wearable.
Food is more than rigidly rationed. In
Russia, unlike this county, it is not a question of a limited amount of sugar and a
more or less unlimited supply of maple
sirup, candy, oranges, jam, milk, honey,
dates, figs and other of forms of sweets.
In Russia it is “either — or”; sometimes it is
neither. The allowance is skipped or postponed to some future month. The Russians do not command such a vast variety
of sweets as America.
I observed last Summer that peasants
were planting in their gardens more pumpkin than usual.
“Why do you do it?” I asked the old
woman of the home in which I was stopping in a village on the Volga.”
“We have five children in the house,”
she said, “and we don’t expect much sugar or candy next Winter. Perhaps we won’t
get any at all. So we’ll bake and steam
pumpkin and give it to the children instead
of sugar.”
Gift of Onions Pleasant
One evening, as I was sending a cable
to America from the Moscow postoffice, I
felt some one’s heavy hand on my back.
Turning, I saw a Russian captain whom I
recognized as a physician I had known in
pre-war Kiev. We talked for a few minutes,
then he said:
“I’ve just come from Central Asia and I
have a gift for you — something you won’t
find in Moscow.”
He pulled out of his knapsack two small
Spanish onions. I grabbed them and, on
my return to the hotel, shared them with
an Australian correspondent and his wife
who were as hungry for a taste of onion as
I. Considering the food situation in Russia,
foreign correspondents are well taken care
of. American correspondents arriving from
London said they were getting more eggs,
butter and meat in Moscow than in the
British capital. But fresh vegetables are so
rare that a Spanish onion is a luxury.
Only the Army has no shortages. At the
front I was served tea and cocoa with all
the sugar I wanted. The best meals correspondents get are at the front. The best
of everything in Russia — food, clothes,
books, entertainment — goes to the Army.
The soldier gets two pounds of bread daily,
more if he wants it; 40 grams of sugar, an
occasional handful of sweet biscuits, about
one-third of a pound of meat, in addition to
the fat in his palatable soup and porridge,
and, of course, 100 grams of vodka. He
is one of the most comfortably-clad and
abundantly-fed soldiers in the world.
But civilians must be content with the
rigidly controlled food rations.
Stalingrad
The destruction last week of what remained of the German Army at Stalingrad
wrote the end to a story that will live for
generations. For sav­age attack and grim
resistance there has been no such siege
in this great war, not even at Leningrad.
The story falls naturally into four phases covering a six-month period: the investment, which really started when Hitler launched his ill-starred of­fensive from
Kursk; the siege itself, with three months
of furious fighting around and within the
city; the Rus­sian counter-offensive, which
isolated the besiegers, and the final annihilation of the enemy army. Today only
the lit­tered streets of Stalingrad are recog­
nizable. The buildings have been blown
away. But in their rubble, in the choked
gutters beside them, and the cellars beneath them, the battle was decided. At its
height the Ger­mans overran more than half
the city. Its fall seemed inevitable. But always on the brink of disaster the Russians
managed to ferry fresh squads across the
Volga, to meet foot by foot the ceaseless
wave of assaults that broke upon the city.
How many men were sacrificed at Stalingrad to Hitler’s «intuition» we may never
know. Some 330,000 were trapped there
in the last stages. As the end approached
German propa­ganda sought to transfer
to the lost Nazi Army the epic of heroism
which belongs to Russia. The Berlin radio
chanted the daily tale of their last-ditch
stand. No doubt there was hard fighting by
some of the German divi­sions. But even
then German prison­ers were yielding in
large numbers. After the last call for sur-
render on Jan. 10 disintegration was rapid.
Three weeks later 91,000 had laid down
their arms, including a field marshal, twen­
ty-three generals and thousands of other
officers. So crushing a defeat throws a
long shadow.
The Times, February 9, 1943
The Chain of Russian
Successes
FROM STALINGRAD TO THE
UKRAINE
EFFECTS OF GERMAN REVERSES
From Our Special Correspondent
STOCKHOLM, FEB. 8
At the end of January it appeared that a
more or less definite stage in the Russian
winter offensive was nearing its close with
the extinction of the German Sixth Army
on the Volga elbow and the expulsion of
the Germans from the Caucasus. The
first week of February showed, however,
that no pause had come and that the first
broad stage was likely to include also the
recovery by the Russians of the whole of
the Donetz Basin. The overlapping impulses of the Russian offensive, which had so
far baffled and disorganized the defensive
effort of the German generals since they
relinquished the initiative in November and
tried to settle down for the winter, were
continuing, and ever more sectors were
being switched into the active southern
front, thus extending the front northwards.
Of four great battles fought since the
early summer (in the Crimea, before Voronezh, on the Don and Volga rivers, and
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02.43
The New York Times,
February 7, 1943
188
in the Caucasus) the Red Army has decisively won three. The Crimea was lost and
has still to be recovered. How the Germans
were fought to a standstill outside Voronezh
in July and August with part of the town in
their hands, how they drove through to Stalingrad on the bank of the Volga, and con-
fidently insisted that they had gained complete victory, how they forged ahead in the
Caucasus and reached the fringes of the
coveted Grozny oilfield are phases of the
German summer and autumn campaign.
THE TURN OF THE TIDE
The tide began to turn in November
when on the 19th the Russians resolutely challenged the already wearied
German initiative at Stalingrad. Russian armoured troops and infantry with
strong artillery struck south and southwest from the Serafimovitch area on
the Don, while a similar force smashed
through to the north-north-west from below the Volga elbow. How this southern
hammerhead had crossed the Volga and
assembled in battle order without advertising its presence to the enemy has not
yet been fully disclosed. German commentators have since described the Russians as “masters at night marching”; but
it is probable too that German reconnaissance was slack during the late autumn,
as it has proved to be in winter conditions on other parts of the front.
In a few days the southern Russian
Army had crossed the railway at Abganerovo and the northern force had
descended into the middle of the Don
bend. In 10 days both armies had joined
and the siege had begun of the besieging Sixth Army, now known to have been
over 300,000 strong, comprising 22 Axis
divisions, mostly German. That this
powerful, experienced army, copiously
equipped as few field armies have ever
been equipped before with guns, armour, and munitions for the reduction of
Stalingrad, could allow itself to be so effectively enveloped and then completely
destroyed would have been pronounced
no less fantastically ridiculous by any
German soldier or civilian than the idea
that its total eclipse would be extolled in
Berlin as “a proud epic of German military hardihood.”
Another surprising fact is that the
German High Command continued to
underrate the power of the fresh armies
which the Russians evoked, as it were,
overnight from the ground, and that no
determined effort was made to relieve
the Sixth Army except by one strong
force which proved not strong enough to
break through the Russian barrier near
Kotelnikovo, and by the costly expedient
of supplying the distressed army with
food by air. The scarcity of food became
acute in January, and it is evident that
fuel shortage was partly responsible for
the relative inactivity in December, as
GERMAN CHANGE OF MIND
The blow which stunned the German
will at Stalingrad in November seemed to
affect the command of the whole southern
front, including the Caucasus. A confident
army flushed with victory experienced a
transition from a wholly offensive into a
wholly defensive force. Certainly winter
conditions were largely responsible for the
change in mind, but the chief factor was
just as certainly the Russian method of offensive warfare which Germans had not
experienced before. Scoffing at the idea
that the Russians could have any really
formidable Ersatzarmee, they had not taken adequate precautions for emergency
beyond the extended scope of an elastic
hedgehog system which tided the Germans over their first winter in Russia. So,
when the Germans found that before Marshal Voronov and Colonel-General Rokossovsky had reached the stage at Stalingrad where they must pause to bring up
materials and regroup for their next offensive, Generals Vatutin and Golikov were
attacking irresistibly westward and driving
them right out of the Don bend, even from
the Voronezh-Rostov railway, they were
surprised and disconcerted, though again
expecting the inevitable pause when they
might launch a powerful counterstroke
with the enemy for the moment more vulnerable and unconsolidated.
Before this pause came, General Yeremenko and other generals hit out afresh
from the Kotelnikovo region towards Salsk
and Rostov, and before this effort had
reached its peak another Russian army on
the Voronezh sector forced the Germans
and Hungarians to execute a rapid “retreat
according to plan,” but not rapid enough
to avert disaster, as one Russian jaw from
the Livny direction and another from the
adjoining sector to the south closed on
the railways, depriving the Germans of
convenient transport routes on which they
go largely depend for mobility in winter.
The “Second Hungarian Army” received a
crushing blow from which it is unlikely to
recover.
While these overlapping offensive
methods were being applied southwards,
the Russians prosecuted operations on
the middle front, developing them at some
points into major battles. Thus, apart from
their immediate objectives, they compelled
the Germans to abandon any ideas they
might have had of temporarily weakening
the middle or northern fronts to send reinforcements south. One of these battles
gave the Russians Velikiye Luki, another
reopened a land corridor to the beleaguered garrison and inhabitants of Leningrad. When winter began German rear
communications were superior to those of
the Russians, and if they had everywhere
held their front positions they would have re-
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02.43
the Russians had captured or destroyed
large dumps of fuel in their first rush.
190
mained so. The Germans depend chiefly on
railways and certain roads, which they keep
open. The Russian Army is less dependent
on roads and railways, being always organized to use even the most primitive sledges,
in which Russia abounds, and accustomed
to large-scale operations across their native
winter countryside. A glance at the map will
show instantly the disadvantage the Rus-
sians were obliged to overcome in advancing against the Voronezh-Rostov railway
from the middle Don. Their superior mobility in snow enabled them to swoop upon or
circumvent and capture a station here and
there, and hold it until the enemy might rush
up reinforcements by railway; but to capture
a junction like Millerovo, after weeks of semisiege, with all the advantages on the enemy
side, must have some other explanation.
They have now captured a dozen or more
Millerovos or similarly placed junctions, with
open country deep in the rear and a good
ramified railway system behind the enemy.
Therein the Russian Army is demonstrating unmistakably that it is at present not
only better officered for the war in hand but
that its men in the field are also more than a
match for Germans in winter warfare.
A COSTLY FAILURE
Even though this winter has been relatively mild, German reports from the front
emphasize as among their most terrible
experiences that they are frequently driven
out by the Russians to dwell and fight in
the open steppes. This happens specially
when the Russians capture a stretch of
railway, compelling the enemy to retreat
across open country to the next line. The
greatest demonstration of Russian crosscountry mobility in winter was given south
of the Don, where Russian arms swept the
whole vast territory thence to the Kalmuck
desert and hustled the enemy back along
the railway from the Caucasus, largely by
outstripping his trains, cutting him off here
and there with dire consequences to entrapped men and material. The enemy is
now out of the Caucasus, for the lingering
remnants pinned against the Azov Sea are
negligible as a military force. A large proportion escaped through Rostov, others
by water to the Crimea and the mainland;
but the whole exploit of the quest for oil
and further living space has been a costly
failure whose ultimate effect on the overweening confidence of the German Army
can scarcely be less than that of the Stalingrad disaster, as no attempt to dramatize the Caucasus campaign can exalt it
into an epic even for German minds.
SPRING PROSPECTS
Rostov lost much of its importance to
the Germans as soon as the gate slammed
on all their conquerors of the Caucasus
who did not manage to return that way.
Kharkov and Orel are threatened by the
Russian advance, but if the Germans
stand and fight for them they should be
satellite forces as they had and exploited
a year ago, whereas the victorious Red
Army faces spring and summer much
more experienced and numerically larger,
more efficient, and more confident than the
army which, after a bad mauling in 1941,
struggled valiantly through the winter to
the spring of 1942. That they will administer to the Germans the above indicated
beating at their next meeting on fair terms
is scarcely to be doubted.
Daily Boston Globe,
February 9, 1943
Russia Pays Price of
Victory in War Rigors Maurice Hindus
This is the second of several
articles by Maurice Hindus, just
back from a seven-month tour of
Russia.
By MAURICE HINDUS
(Copyright. 1943, Boston Globe and
New York Herald Tribune, Inc.)
Russia is winning victories because
she is willing to pay the price in life, in comfort, in convenience.
“What did you eat for supper tonight?” I
asked the wife of a Russian physician.
“Soup, bread, porridge,” was the answer, “which is precisely what I had last
night and the night before.”
She told me American lard was one of
the greatest luxuries in Moscow. People
spread it on bread, eat it like butter and
love it.
Russians are among the heaviest
191
02.43
able to hold out till the spring. The question
is whether the Germans in their present retiring mood think it worth while or prefer
a further shortening of their front. Other
sectors to the north which have been stationary for a whole year are giving real or
simulated signs of coming activity and certainly causing the Germans anxiety.
The Russians have defied the rigours
of winter to a far greater degree than their
friends or foes expected. Whether and to
what extent they are able to defy the mud of
spring and continue a non-stop offensive remains to be seen. The whole German forces
of the southern front are badly shaken, but
in main not disorganized and still capable of
stubborn resistance so long as they do not
irrevocably lose confidence in their generals
and the Supreme Command. However far
they may “voluntarily” retire before spring,
they may still be deep in Russia, and not
till they have taken their first sound beating
by the Red Army when winter is past and
they are no longer able to complain that the
enemy is favoured by natural elements can
their final defeat be considered in sight. The
southern German armies, however, are utterly incapable of recovering for any real
summer offensive resembling what they undertook in 1942, and ground does not exist
for believing that the Supreme Command
can conjure up any new or reserve army
to begin the 1942 programme or anything
similar over again. The more northern armies may conceivably stage some local offensive, which they have omitted to do since
1941, for instance, against Moscow, but it is
unlikely that they can afford such a doubtful
spectacular effort.
One fact is certain: the Germans in
Russia are a much less formidable military force now than last summer and have
scarcely as good prospects of enlisting
192
bread eaters in the world. Fortunately, the
bread rations are, on the whole, satisfactory; in the case of peasants away from the
periphery of the large cities and of workers in the factories, the ration is more than
ample.
The continuous overfulfilment of production plans in the factories and the highgrade work on the collective farms testify
to a physical well-being which would have
been impossible on a starvation diet. Food
conditions are bad, but not desperate, and
in many plants which have their own vegetable and dairy farms the meals are more
than satisfactory.
Prices in the open market are high. But
it must be kept in mind that no more than
8 percent of the nation’s food is supplied
by the open market. In government stores
prices are fixed, and comparatively low.
Eight-Hour Day Forgotten
And how they work! The eight-hour
labor day is all but forgotten. Eleven and
12 hours is the rule in Russian factories.
Again and again foremen and engineers
remain on their jobs 20 and 30 hours without rest. An engineer in the huge Gorki au-
tomobile plant told me that at the time the
Germans were making their drive on Moscow he and his men never left the factory
for five weeks. They worked day and night.
“I don’t know how we stood it,” he said,
“but we did.”
Woe to the worker who is late 10 minutes or even less! The first time he commits the offense he is privately reprimanded by the superintendent or the director of
the factory. The second time he is publicly,
reprimanded and his name appears in the
list of offenders on the bulletin board. If he
is late a third time in the same month, he is
tried by a people’s court.
If he is ever late more than 20 minutes
without the most valid reasons, even if it is
a first offense he must also stand trial. He
is seldom acquitted. The penalty is three
to four months of “redeeming labor”: he remains at his regular job, but from 15 to 25
percent of his salary during the period of
the sentence is deducted as a fine which
is paid not to the factory but to the government.
Nobody Takes a Vacation
Nobody takes a vacation in Russia. No
one is exempt from labor excepting invalids
and women with too many small children.
There are no janitors and no charwomen
in Russian schools. Pupils and teachers
themselves scrub, wipe clean and heat the
classrooms.
Last Summer Moscow faced the problem of laying in fuel for the Winter. Coal
from the Ukraine was cut off. Oil from the
Caucasus was needed for war purposes.
For the first time in years Moscow had to
be largely heated with wood. Who would
cut wood? Factory workers could not be
spared for that purpose; so housemaids,
Savings Given for War
The Russian people wholeheartedly
support the defense of the country not only
with life and labor, but also with their earnings and savings.
“What taxes are you paying?” I asked a
former izvoschik of 61, now driving a team
for a Moscow warehouse.
“My wages,” he said, “are 375 rubles
a month; after taxes and other levies are
deducted I have 260 rubles left.”
The official exchange rate is five rubles
to the American dollar. This means that a
wage-earner receiving $75 a month pays
$21 in taxes.
There was always a stiff income tax
in Russia for people in the higher income
groups, including writers, artists, musicians, engineers and factory managers.
Since the start of the war, income taxes
have been substantially increased for other income groups.
A man exempted from military service
because of health or some special work he
is doing must pay an additional income tax
of 50 to 200 percent.
Levy Taken on Wages
One or two days’ wages go every
month to the defense fund as a levy. Then
there are lotteries and special collections
for gifts to men at the front or in hospitals,
and these, too, have to be met.
Just before I left Moscow there appeared on the front page of leading newspapers a telegram to Stalin from the secretary of the party in Tambov Province,
informing him that 40,000,000 rubles had
been gathered on collective farms for the
building of a special tank column for the
Army. Every province in Russia has been
making similar collections for planes,
shells, tanks, field guns and other armaments.
At the outbreak of the war people
threw their government bonds into the
defense fund. Writers and artists, among
the highest-paid people in Russia, started
the campaign, and others followed suit. At
least one-half of the internal debt had already been canceled through these voluntary donations.
The Times, February 10, 1943
The New Note
in the Reich
It is no mere chance that the latest
phase of GOEBBEL’S propaganda should
draw heavily upon the Nibelungenlied, with
all its mystical and gory memories and motives. It is deftly attuned to the mood which
the regime is now so evidently anxious to
induce throughout the nation. That it may
well succeed in putting a still stronger spell
of morbid fanaticism upon the German
people is a warning against treating it lightly as evidence of desperation. The dead
of Stalingrad have been made the occasion not only for national mourning but
also for national exaltation of the martial
virtues and self-sacrificial qualities of the
race. “The Germans at “Stalingrad,” one
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02.43
office workers, housewives — about
50,000 of them — were sent to the forests
for three or four months to cut wood.
Last Summer we saw few children in
the cities. They were out in the country,
not on vacations, but at work, cultivating
crops and gathering harvests.
194
commentator writes, “had no alternative
but to set up the greatest example in our
history of 300 German Spartans at some
German “Thermopylae.” The “heroic halo”
serves other purposes than the commemoration of the dead; it is being brazenly
and blatantly used to obscure the failings
of the living. Not since its overthrow of
the Weimar Republic hag the Hitler party
had to face such serious questioning as in
the last month. When the German Press
complains of “heretical mouths” and talks
of violent means to shut them it is not unreasonable to assume that some criticism
of the regime has begun to make itself
felt. The Reichsleiter, Gauleiter, and leaders of formations of the party met at the
weekend under BORMANN, head of the
party Chancery and HESS’S successor,
and discussed the mobilization – which is
to be directed by the party – of the home
front for total war. Afterwards they went to
HITLER’S headquarters. All this reflects
the determination of the party leaders to
reinforce their hold on the public by every
means.
What the Germans call “the law of
“hardness” is now in force. The civilian
mobilization, to be rushed to completion
by March 15, means the closing of department stores and many thousands of small
shops and one-man businesses. Ironically, the end of the department stores is
represented as partial fulfillment – belated
it certainly is – of the twelfth point of the
party’s unalterable programme which provided for the disappearance of such places
so that the small shopkeeper might have
his chance. The stores are being closed
by the exigencies of war, but the small
shopkeeper is not getting his chance. Instead he is being drafted into a factory,
and, in any case, the goods are not there
for him to sell. There is also a suspicion
that the party is glad of the opportunity to
eliminate so many small shopkeepers and
craftsmen whose obstinate independence
of thinking and working is not to its liking.
Justification for this new upheaval in German economic life is sought in the need to
man every rampart for the repulse of the
enemy from the east. GOEBBELS and the
party machine are working the bogy of Bolshevism to capacity. Europe is being pictured as abandoned by all except the Germans. One commentator among many of
the same mind finds it “incomprehensible”
that Germany, “the “bulwark of European
civilization,” should – as he puts it – have
been “stabbed in the back” by Great Britain, the United States, and France. Thus
the German is cast for the part of saviour
of the imperilled citadel of Western culture.
The psychological appeal is strong.
So much for the German at home. The
propaganda directed abroad is not less
strident, artificial, and arrogant. It has also
a scarifying note; and both the enslaved
and the neutrals are warned of the dreadful things which will happen to them unless they put all their material and moral
strength at the service of Europe – which
in this connexion means Hitlerite Germany. The Germans are so built that they can
see no contradiction between such an appeal and their own record since 1939, with
its bloody invasions of unoffending countries, its defilement and destruction of life,
its famine, concentration camps, innocent
hostages, and firing squads. Some may
succumb to the appeal, but not many at
this time of day. The “Bolshevist hordes”
of ROSENBERG’S demonology are fighting to free their fatherland; the Hitlerite
hordes are fighting to hold in subjection
the lands they have enslaved and robbed.
nehmen. German strength is, it is true,
still immense and will be resourcefully and
resolutely used. It must not be underrated:
But arrayed against it is the massive and
still mounting power of the allies. The people of this country are making their own
last preparations for this year of decision.
Their endeavours and plans must and will
be so ordered as to supplement Russia’s
mighty effort and to consume those reserves on which German military hopes
are now set. A hard struggle will be harder
yet; but it will be sustained by unflinching
confidence in its purpose and its conclusion.
The New York Times,
February 11, 1943
In the Stones
of Stalingrad
Reporters who have talked to the
Germans captured in the graveyard of
Stalingrad note the sharp contrast be­
tween the temper of the officers and the
ordinary soldiers. All these men have experienced the hell they have created for
others in their savage drive over Europe.
They are sorry specimens, the broken
and ragged remnants of the arrogant armies that rolled over Poland and France
and Greece in the first fine rapture of
conquest and de­struction. They stumbled
out of their cellars, over the frozen heaps
of their own dead, like scarecrows in a
scene of desolation. Through the eyes of
the correspondents on the spot we see a
field of stones, without a street or a house
or a tree or any landmark to show that
this was once a city. We see, too, the hu-
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02.43
The true extremists and wreckers are in
Berlin. In a timely and admirable broadcast
at the weekend SIR ARCHIBALD CLARK
KERR, the British Ambassador in Moscow, called attention to the use the Germans are making of the bogy. They used
it in 1933, the AMBASSADOR said, and
“they are “at it again.” His confidence that
in 1943 it will fail utterly is well rooted. The
British people regard it with indifference
or contempt: Their alliance with Russia is
the bedrock of present action and future
policy. The bonds between the two peoples have stood many strains; they have
been reforged in the fire of war and adversity; and they will not snap now that the
destruction of German military power has
been brought within reach as a plainly attainable goal.
HEINE, in a famous passage of his
essay on the romantic school of German
literature, remarked on the different connotations, the, word “patriotism” had in
France and Germany. Allowances may be
made for the circumstances in which he
wrote. To the German, he said, “patriotism”
meant contracting the heart, hating foreigners, ceasing to be European and cosmopolitan, and adopting “a narrow-minded
and exclusive Germanism.” He summed
it all up as the establishment of an “ideal
empire of “churlishness” – a moderate description of the regime which the Germans
of to-day have set up in Europe. Such an
empire had no place in HEINE’S world;
it can have none in this. Its doom has already been sounded on the battlefields of
Russia and Africa. German commentators
speak of a “decisive “ increase of the war
potential as a result of total civilian mobilization of “surprises “ being prepared for
the allies; even of redeeming HITLER’S
pledge. Und wir werden Stalingrad noch
196
man wreckage of a great German Army,
the generals sullen, tight-lipped and full
of venom; the sol­diers starved, confused
and glad to be captured.
To the haughty officers of the Sixth
Army to be prisoners of the Russians is
the final humiliation. They are bit­ter, and
what they think of Hitler for sending them
to the Volga and leaving them there to
perish probably explains much of their
bitterness. But the sol­diers express their
opinions openly. Since Duesseldorf and
Cologne, one of them told a reporter, are
now almost as bad as Stalingrad, they
and sacrificed everything for failure, their
revulsion against Hitler is sure to be as
terrible as the fury of conquered nations.
What the gaunt and beaten soldiers of
Stalingrad say today all Germany will be
saying to­morrow.
The Times, February 12, 1943
Sober Mood in Reich
STALINGRAD AND AFTER
HUNGARY’S PEACE TALK
From Our Diplomatic Correspondent
can no longer believe their Fuehrer is a
super­man. «These fellows could stand
al­most anything from Hitler,» adds their
interlocutor, «but not failure.»
Applied to the Germans in general,
this observation has great significance.
The break in Germany will not come
suddenly or soon. Hitler still commands
powerful weapons which he will use to
the utmost, against the Germans them­
selves, if necessary; Stalingrad is the
proof of how little he values his troops
compared to his own pride. But when the
people realize that they have en­dured
Germany is still suffering very much
from what a commentator calls “the Passion of Stalingrad.” There is “a profound
convulsion of our soul and life.” In the circumstances, therefore, it is not surprising
that a mass of contradictions is coming out
of Germany.
Whatever reinforcement the new total
mobilization of civilians may mean to labour-power – and the soberest estimate in
London is that it will be neither immense
nor immediate – its propagandist uses are
being exploited to the full. It is to be deduced that the morale of the fighting men
has been affected by the spectacle, incongruous and affronting alongside the frozen
dead on the Russian front, of labour still being directed to the service of a life of luxury
and leisure for some persons on the home
front. That labour should be occupied in,
as one writer says, “perming” women’s
hair and perfuming women’s ears is held
to be not seemly in a life-and-death struggle such as Germany now faces.
Consequently there is a good deal of
rather sour delight being expressed at the
INTUITIONS RESTRAINED
Civilian mobilization and the emotionalism which has gone with it have helped
to distract attention from Hitler’s strategic blunders. There is some independent
evidence that the Führer’s intuitions in
military maters are now being restrained.
The present so-called shortening of the
German front in the east, however disguised or represented, has been imposed on him by his High Command as
the only means of escaping a worse Stalingrad. The final line on which the High
Command hopes to stand is known to it
alone, but – taking no account of what
the relentless and resourceful Russians
may do – the line it has in mind must go
well back if it is to make possible that
concentration of forces for which the revised strategical plan seems to provide.
The Germans are now hinting that another six weeks of violent winter fighting
may be expected on the eastern front,
and that in the meantime Germany and
her allies are mobilizing their resources
for the summer campaign. That Germany is doing so – for use either against
the Russians or for other purposes – is
certain; that her satellites have any intention of engaging in further military
adventures in the east is highly unlikely.
The signs are all the other way. Finland
has no stomach for more fighting, and
is thinking rather of the least onerous
terms of peace she can extract. There
are – as the Istanbul Correspondent of
The Times showed in his dispatch yesterday – a good many second thoughts
in the Balkans and elsewhere, and in
one or two cases a certain shakiness.
“BLAMELESS” HUNGARY
Hungary is particularly active in protesting her blamelessness and her yearning
for peace. According to a report received
in London yesterday, the Hungarian Minister to the Vatican sounded the Pope late in
January about his willingness to exert his
influence in favour of a separate Hungarian peace. The Pope is said to have shown
marked reserve, intimating that before the
Vatican would be able to consider intervention Hungary must first demonstrate
to the whole world that she had once for
all severed her political and moral ties with
the Axis – for example, by withdrawing the
contingents now fighting in Russia and the
repeal of all Gleichschaltung laws, above
all, her anti-Jewish legislation.
The Pope’s reaction, the report goes
on, was so discouraging that the Minister
summoned from Budapest the Hungarian Primate, who himself approached the
Pope on the same subject. It is asserted
that official circles in Budapest say that
the Primate defined Hungary’s attitude
thus: (1) She had never harboured any territorial ambitions at Russia’s expense; (2)
She desired nothing beyond peace with
honour; (3) She wished to know whether
through the good offices of the Holy See
a peace was obtainable by which Hungary
would keep her present frontiers; (4) If so,
and in the event of an Anglo-American invasion of the Balkans, Hungary would not
197
02.43
promised disappearance of “luxury” cars
and hotels, and note is taken of such a detail, for instance, as that trolleys for hors
d’oeuvres are no longer to be tolerated.
How far the opulent way of life of such party leaders as Göring, Goebbels, and Ribbentrop will be affected by the new austerity remains to be seen.
198
consent to allow the use of her territory for
the passage of German troops.
The report then says that if Great Britain
and the United States abandoned Hungary
to a Russian invasion, as the German-controlled Budapest newspapers Magyarsag
and Függetlenseg daily warned the people
they would, then the Hungarian people,
fearing a recurrence of the events of 1919,
would feel that they had no choice but to
fight shoulder to shoulder with the Germans
to the last. The report adds that Budapest
has since instructed Hungarian diplomatists
in Ankara and Lisbon to intimate its willingness to conclude peace on such terms.
“ROMMEL OF THE SEA”
German propaganda has an eye for
such tendencies. Civilian mobilization was
designed in part to impress and reassure
the satellites. So is the emphasis put on the
U-boat as the weapon of victory. Dönitz,
the new commander-in-chief of the navy,
is being spoken of as “the Rommel of the
sea,” and it would be the grossest folly for
the allies to underrate his expressed determination to carry through a wide extension
of the U-boat campaign. It is said that as
Dönitz developed the “pack” system in tactics, so German engineers have evolved,
the “pack” system in production. The mass
production of U-boat parts is widely dispersed. Communication between factories
and assembly halls is maintained – so the
Germans say – through technical offices
set up in, among other towns, Berlin, Vienna, Danzig, and Katowice.
The picture, then, which is being presented to the German people and the
outside world is, first, of the Wehrmacht
holding the Russians on some unspecified
line while mounting its own summer offensive, and, secondly, of fierce and extended U-boat operations to whittle away the
strength of an allied invasion in Western or
Southern Europe.
Chicago Daily Tribune,
February 15, 1943
The Strange Coalition
War against Germany has created an
alliance of expediency with Russia, the
British empire, and the United States as
the principal com­batants. The war against
Japan finds Australia, New Zealand, India,
China, and the United States in the principal roles. Against Germany the load is
being carried by Russia, against Japan
by the United States, particularly in the air
and on the sea.
Altho Russia and Japan have been in a
state of half-war ever since the Lenin revolution in 1917, they are carefully keeping
their hands off each other in this war. We
are supporting Russia against Germany.
Russia is not supporting the United States
against Japan. Until June, 1941, Russia
continuance of monarchical government
where the people want it, but it would be
a strange episode in our behavior if we
should pretend that in a light for democracy the restora­tion of kings is a true objective rather than a probable incident.
Mr. Churchill and his ministers have
made it clear that the preservation of the
empire and the recovery of its lost territory
is the object of the war and will be the reward of victory. This includes, it has been
made plain, the recovery and retention of
Hongkong and probably of the leased territory of Kowloon. Freedom for China is to
contain something equivalent to the holding of New Orleans by a foreign power.
The recovery of the British empire means
also the recovery of the Dutch empire and
the regaining of lost parts of the French
empire. Freedom is to sweep the world but
leave the shackles on. The Italian empire,
having been lost by its possessor, will be
taken under the protection of the victors.
That will be one change.
Expediency makes a war coalition of
these in­congruous elements possible.
They have in com­mon the need of victory. As allies they have their troubles, their
suspicions and intrigues, but dan­ger holds
them together. Victory will release them
from danger. What then will hold them together? Some of our people believe that
they will remain on a high ground of ideals
and our principal governmental spokesmen talk as if it were an assured fact. They
talk as if Russia, China, the empires, and
the kings, without any fundamental change
in their natures, were in complete accord
with American ideas which are opposed
to empires, to the possession of subject
peoples, to monarchy, to dictatorship, and
to government without the consent of the
governed.
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02.43
was an ally of Germany in overrunning
eastern Europe and was fighting preliminary, testing battles of real intensity with
Japan along the Amur river. These are
peculiar relations, but nothing to cause
particular remark at this time. There are
others like them.
The India which fights in the war is the
India of the British raj, of the viceroy, the
native princes, and the Indian professional
soldiers, The India of Gandhi, Nehru, and
the Congress party is rebelling against
the empire and demanding what America
says is the great objective of the war —
freedom. That is lavishly promised by the
United States, and many subject peoples
think it means them. Some sovereign peoples do not con­cede that it applies in the
regions of their subjects.
China, in the beginning of its struggle
with Japan was the war ward of Russia
and had aid from the soviets when it got
none from any other charter. Now Russia
is cold, if not hostile, to Chungking and the
Chinese generalissimo, Chiang Kai-shek,
is hostile to the Chinese Communist army
in the north. There are the smoldering
causes of civil war in these antagonisms
which were bitter before and may be
again. China, because it hates Japanese
domination and fights it so stubbornly, is
called a democracy, altho it has none of
the governmental characteristics of one.
Refugee members of monarchical
families abound in England, Canada, and
the United States. They are awaiting the
fortunate decision of the war to return to
their countries and resume the old life. Mr.
Roosevelt has promised some of them
that such will be their good fortune. They
will be the beneficiaries of what will be
called the triumph of democracy. Americans could have no valid objection to the
200
War can carry many follies in its train.
Cer­tainly there could be no greater folly
than the assumption here that the conflict
has prepared the way for the acceptance
of our principles all over the world by nations which have no use for them, which
have use for compensations, re­wards, and
profits. Europe has always regarded these
advantages as excellent reasons for winning a war.
Daily Boston Globe,
February 15, 1943
Hindus Sees Soviet
System Gaining
Popularity in Russia
By MAURICE HINDUS
(Copyright, 1943, Boston Globe and
New York Tribune, Inc.)
Endless are the questions the world is
asking about Russia. It is not the aim of
this article or this series to answer all or
most of them.
But for the guidance of readers I’d like
to set down certain basic facts I have observed about the people, government
and civilization of the country. Without a
knowledge of these facts it is hopeless to
attempt an evaluation of Russia’s position
in the world either today or tomorrow. First
and foremost, the Soviet Government is
more powerful now than it has ever been
since its rise to power. The prophecies of
diplomats, military observers, students of
Russia, like the anticipations of Hitler and
many of his closest advisers, that the war
would bring rebellion and the overthrow
of the existing government, have fallen on
barren soil. The wish for such an eventuality has again and again insulated foreign
observers, Nazis and others against a
judicial appraisal of the Soviets, the economic plans, the people and everything
else pertaining to national stability and national strength.
Since the outbreak of the war, the civilian population has been armed to the
teeth. There is not a Russian who cannot
lay his hands on a gun or a hand grenade.
Factories, schools, collective farms bristle
with arms. Nor are there many Russians
who do not know how to handle them.
These arms the people have used not
against their government but against the
German invaders. The fiercest enemy of
the Soviets cannot afford to overlook this
fact.
Impressed by Stability
Never have I been so impressed with
the stability and strength of is Soviet Government as last Summer when I made a
study of a rural district that had been liberated after nearly a year of German occupation. Never had I observed more
closely its capacity to reconstruct life and
the means whereby Russians live. This
capacity is the chief source of the Soviet
Government’s stability and power, and will
further solidify its hold on the people.
I was amazed at the speed with which
relief had come to a district where the Germans had seized every chicken, every
egg, every pig, every sack of grain, every,
potato and where the people had been living, as they put it, ‘on grass.’ A British journalist and I had brought food with us; we
had to take it back to Moscow.
Nothing is privately controlled in Russia, not even charity. Incidentally, that
their ruined homes and their devastated
village. The administration seeks to discourage tears and lamentations. They do
it with food, especially bread and hot soup,
with plans and schemes of restoration and
with work.
They bring in livestock. The amount
may be small, but the cows provide some
milk for the children. Oxen or horses make
possible immediate tillage of the land. Implements appear simultaneously with the livestock; so does seed. As much as possible
of the land is plowed according to the plan.
Activities Reorganized
Slowly cultural activities are being re-
organized in the villages. Evenings there
may be a collective reading of a Moscow
newspaper, a lecture, a concert by a company on the way to or from the front. There
may be an amateur theatrical performance
by local talent. More often, a portable film
is shown in a public building.
Usually the returning population is
greatly in need of warm clothing. The administration sends word to some district
Soviet in the province which has not been
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02.43
word is no longer used, Russians speak of
“government help.” Unless transport conditions interfere such help comes quickly
in the wake of victory. Evidently there are
special reserves of food and other things
for this purpose.
The district I visited was stricken
with typhus. The old hospital had been
wrecked by the Germans. So nurses and
doctors fitted up a hospital in several available buildings and at once started a campaign against the epidemic. They isolated
all known cases and inoculated the people
with the necessary serum.
“We have it well in hand now,” said the
woman doctor whom I interviewed.
Not only do food and medicine appear
in the wake of German retreat, but Soviet
and party administrations bob up as if out
of the earth.
Russian methods of bringing back civil
administration to liberated villages are illuminating, and have stirred in the village
communities more good will than the Soviets ever knew in pre-war days.
The administration proceeds immediately with the task of rehabilitation. Usually, if they have time, the retreating Germans drive the civilian population ahead
of them. But groups of civilians take to the
woods and underground shelters, and as
soon as the Germans depart they return
home.
Often enough there is no home. There
is only a heap of ashes. There is neither
barn nor shed — everything has been
burned. The Soviet administration, which
is set up after the village is liberated, helps
them find shelter somewhere — if only in a
dugout shared with another family, usually
relatives.
Sad, weary, angry, the people, especially older folk, weep a great deal over
202
under German occupation, or to some factory, requesting an immediate collection of
all kinds of warm clothing which the people can spire. The local Soviet or trade union in the factory does the collecting and
sends the clothes on to the Soviet in the
destitute village or farm.
Life, of course, is hard. Food rations are
rigid. There are few things to buy. There
is some soap but not much. There is not
enough in the country to provide ample rations for any one but the Army, the hospitals and the nurseries. There is a shortage
of tobacco. There is no fruit and very few
fresh vegetables.
Some Grumbling
Naturally there is grumbling. But the
peasants cannot help asking themselves
what would have happened to them had
there been no Soviets to help them get reestablished. Where would they get a horse
or an ox to work their land? Where would
they get a plow, or seed or other indispensable articles? In fact they have been conditioned to look in time of emergency only
to the government for aid; and in these
dark times more than ever do they place
hope of recovery in government agencies.
Already the Soviets are promising to
provide them in time, especially when the
war is over, with building materials for new
houses, new barns, new schools, new
hospitals, new clubhouses.
Listening to Soviet officials in these
reconquered villages, one gets the feeling
that life is beginning all over for a people that
has been wantonly and completely ruined
and degraded by the German invaders.
The work of reconstruction, as much as
the successful operation of Russian industry and Russian agriculture, and the fight-
ing capacity of the Russian Armies make
the Soviets more powerful and popular
than they have ever been. To underestimate or disregard this fact is to underestimate or disregard one of the basic realities
of our times.
Ready to Fight for System
Whatever we may feel about it, however the Russian system may be repugnant
to us and contrary to our experience, tradition, habit of thought or individual ambition, in Russia it has come to stay, unless
the government is overthrown and a new
government is forced on the nation.
There is not a chance in the world of
the Russians abandoning or modifying the
foundations of their economic system. The
young generation knows no other. Any attempt to exert pressure, direct or indirect,
from the outside to achieve a change is
certain to meet with mighty defiance on
the part of the Russian people, and will be
resisted with every drop of Russian energy
and Russian blood.
It must be emphasized that in Russia
this mode of economic control is no longer
regarded even by former private bankers or
manufacturers as an experiment. The system has survived the strain of the cruelest
and most desperate war Russia has ever
fought, above all a mechanized war. Despite
Germany’s much older and more seasoned
industrial machine, despite her superior
industrial output, Russia, with the increasing aid of American and British equipment
has been able to stage a swift and vigorous counter-offensive. We must reconcile
ourselves to the thought that collectivized
control of property is as basic to Russian life
today as national consciousness, and will be
as violently defended and upheld.
of the war, exhausted as her people may
feel, they will not only resent, they will oppose and, if necessary, fight any effort to
build a coalition against them.
The very word “coalition” rouses deep
emotion in Russia. To the Russians it
means an attempt not only to build a wall
around them but to mass together a military force against them. Any one with the
least knowledge of Russia and Russians Stalin, the Soviets, the youth or the people
in general - must know that under what-
Will Resent Coalition
People in America often ask what Russians will want to do at the end of the war.
No one can possibly answer this question
now, for much depends on how, when and
under what circumstances the war will
end. After spending seven months in Russia and traveling more or less extensively,
to the limit of the permission granted me,
I have the feeling that the Russians want
nothing so much as to bind and heal their
wounds and start to live again in some degree of comfort. The last thing they want is
more fighting anywhere.
But I must repeat: much depends on
the shape of things to come and on the
international relationships that are built up
or spring up in the Allied world.
Of one thing we can be certain. Bled
profusely as Russia may be at the end
ever idea, name or guise a coalition may
pass, the Russians are certain to recognize it and to battle against it with all the
physical and spiritual power at their command.
It should also be kept in mind that Russia is the most powerful nation in Asia. Not
even Japan can now match the heavy and
machine-building industry which Russia
possesses in the Urals, Siberia and central
Asia. It is especially important to remember this fact in any attempt to visualize
post-war policies and possibilities.
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02.43
The new Russia which the war has revealed also has demonstrated something
else equally momentous. It has learned to
build factories, the largest and most complicated, with its own hands and its own
resources. In the very midst of war the
Russians have erected and equipped hundreds of new factories, among them the
largest blast furnace in Europe. This is not
the place to discuss how they do it but to
emphasize the fact that they can do it and
have done it.
After the war, with all the ruin they will be
compelled to face, the Russians will have
more than abundant work on their hands
for years and years to come. Yet should
circumstances arise which will make it politically or economically feasible for them to
help a backward nation become industrialized, they will not shrink from the task and
they are equipped to do it.
204
The Times, February 22, 1943
The Red Army
Throughout Great Britain meetings
have been held during the week-end in
celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary
of the creation of the Red Army. The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS
spoke in London at the Albert Hall, and
Ministers of Cabinet rank were heard in a
dozen other great cities. In one sense no
commemoration of the anniversary by the
allies of Russia can enhance the celebration that the Red Army is making for itself.
Si monumentum requiris circumspice. Victory is the finest possible consummation of
military traditions; and when every mile of
the Army’s victorious advance is liberating
more of the soldiers’ countrymen from the
foulest of oppressions, there is little that
the drums and trumpets of jubilee can add
to the rejoicings. But from another point of
view it is a happy accident that while the
Red Army is in the full career of reconquest there should fall the date that summons soldiers and civilians alike to recall
its humble beginnings a quarter of a century ago; and the friends of Russia welcome
the opportunity to offer any homage that
the warmest admiration can pay. They are
headed by the KING, who pays tribute with
his peoples to the resounding triumphs
of Soviet prowess, and commands that a
lasting memorial of the occasion be prepared, in the form of a sword of honour,
to be presented to the heroic city of Stalingrad.
In his choice of a particular civic community to receive emblematically the honour that the British Empire accords to the
whole people of the Soviet Union, the
KING rightly signalizes the victory that, in
the light of every day’s crowding news,
stands out more clearly as the decisive
battle of the whole war on land. The tide
has turned; it is unlikely to turn again; and
where it turned we can see. “Never in all its
long, proud history,” said MR. EDEN yesterday, “has the German army sustained
such an unmitigated disaster as the Red
Army has inflicted upon it in the battle of
Stalingrad.” To-morrow’s anniversary is a
reminder that victories so epoch-making
as this do not come by chance and cannot be extemporized, but crown the pa-
The Red Army was founded in order
to maintain the Russian people’s right to
exist under its own forms of social and political organization. By its endurance, its
valour, and its victories, it has established
something more. On the four Powers that
have proved strong enough to ride out the
storm of the new barbarism rests the responsibility to make themselves the four
chief pillars of the future world. The British
Empire, the United States of America, the
Chinese Republic, and the Soviet Union
are all communities representing widely
differing forms of political and social faith:
but they have learnt in the stress of battle that the ideals and the necessities they
share go deeper, and they have the task
of building up in years to come, on the basis of these common ideals, a synthesis of
practical relations in which the diversities
of expression can be reconciled. To such a
synthesis the Soviet Union and Great Brit-
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02.43
tient and arduous labours of a whole people over many years of constant purpose.
The Red Army was founded in a moment
of military defeat and disintegration. The
Russian Empire had collapsed, and its
soldiers were streaming home from the
crumbling battle-front. The Germans were
marching upon Petrograd, and the leaders
of the nascent Republic, in order to preserve its bare existence, were constrained
to sign the Peace of Brest-Litovsk, the
most brutal and avaricious treaty that
an arrogant victor has dictated in modern times. Before they signed, the Soviet
founders had already drawn the moral of
their humiliation, that the fortune of ideals
depends on the readiness of their devotees not only to work but to fight and die for
them. They gave orders for the enrolment
of a Red Army of Workmen and Peasants
for the defence of the revolution, and its
first formations were raised on February
23, 1918.
The force was made up from broken remnants of the Tsarist armies, with
34,000 of the Red Guards of the revolution. Its organization was rudimentary, and
its equipment pitifully inadequate; and in
its early years of civil and foreign war it
passed through grievous tribulations and
defeats. But at the heart of it was that
source of strength which makes an army
indestructible; for it represented the faith of
a people in the great social experiment to
which they had consecrated themselves.
The people’s army of the days of weakness in 1918 is still the people’s at this
moment of their supreme and victorious
effort; it is because through these twentyfive years it has never lost touch with the
people or ceased to draw its strength from
the people’s life that it has proved itself invincible by all the malice of the invader.
206
ain are now closely bound by their twentyyear treaty of alliance.
The spirit of a nation no longer fighting for survival, but bearing the burden of
the defence of a world order and marching to establish a world authority, is apparent in the strategy of the Red Army in this
week of commemoration. The commanders have evidently determined to attempt
the big thing rather than the little thing, to
operate on the broadest lines and aim at
the greatest results. Their objective is to
destroy rather than expel the invader; and
they understand destruction in the sense
that they exhibited at Stalingrad. The latest
thrusts towards the Dnieper line show the
scale of controlled imagination on which
they work. That which has been driven
from Kharkov through Krasnodar aims
directly at Dnepropetrovsk, as may that
which has been launched from Lozovaya
through Pavlograd; but the latter may also
look towards Zaporozhe and the control of
the whole eastern reach of the river. Evidently great weight has been put behind
these movements, with the object of continuing the out- flanking movement against
the German armies in the Donetz bend,
and that with the most powerful effect, by
striking at their main rather than their local
communications. The outflanking movement is probably being widened through
the important rail junction of Poltava, with
a possibility of following the railway from
Kharkov to strike the Dnieper higher up at
Kremenchug.
It would be a very great feat to capture
Dnepropetrovsk and get behind the elbow
of the Dnieper; and even to close upon
these positions would virtually cut the enemy’s communications. Undoubtedly he
still faces the possibility of a crushing disaster. The German broadcaster SERTO-
RIUS has acknowledged that “the danger
of encirclement is by no means past.” Under the stimulus of their proud anniversary
the Red Army may be trusted to make a
supreme effort for a triumph that would be
the culmination of their glorious record of
victories.
The Times, February 22, 1943
The Man Who Fights
In the Red Army
ACHIEVEMENTS IN RETREAT AND
ADVANCE
OUTLOOK OF THE MODERN RUSSIAN
SOLDIER
From Our Special Correspondent
MOSCOW, FEB. 21
Anniversaries are always dear to the
Russians, but this year the coincidence
of the date of the Red Army's twenty-fifth
birthday with a period when such resounding successes are attending its efforts
decks the day with particular solemnity.
Birthdays are usually an occasion for looking back through the years, but to-day it
is towards the months immediately ahead
that imagination of the Soviet Union's people is straining. Yet for most the day commemorates personal tragedy, for there
is scarcely a family that has not suffered
some loss. Millions who have served the
Red Army during 20 months of struggle
lie buried under Russian soil in «brotherly
graves,» as they are movingly called here,
or are perishing in German prison camps.
Those 20 months have been divided
almost equally into periods of retreat and
advance. In which the Red Army has most
A PATIENT SOLDIER
Yet the fighting men of Britain and
America would not feel strangers beside him. Differences of temperament, of
course, there are, and many would perhaps find it strange that members of nonRussian nationalities – Mongols, Uzbeks,
Turkmens, and Kazakhs – fought with
equal rank and prestige beside Russians
and Ukrainians. Over one-third of those
awarded decorations during the war were
non-Russians.
In company they would find the Russian soldier quieter, more reserved, more
formal in his attitude towards his fellows
than they are used to; and in intimacy
more impulsive, articulate, and emotional.
In moments of grief, anger, and triumph
he is more exalted but in the humdrum
everyday experiences of life perhaps a
little more patient. He smiles less, rarely
laughs, but sighs more; cynicism is far
from his nature and his favourite songs,
like the popular “Dug-out” and “Let’s have
a smoke,” are wistful and tender, his thirst
for education is unquenched by his experiences and many go into battle with
text-books in their pockets; his taste is
extraordinarily high. That is no new feature of the Red Army. The favourite play
of the Chapayev Division in the civil war
is said to have been the Spanish “Fuente
ovejuna,” by Lopez de Vega. It is a moving
experience to sit beside simple Red Army
men on short leave watching the fairylike
beauty of Tchaikovsky’s “The Swan Lake”
at the Moscow ballet theatre.
HOME AND FAMILY
Their feeling for home and family is intense, and the exchange of letters is felt
to be vitally important. The young Russian
poet, Eugene Dolmatovsky, told me that
on a sector of the Stalingrad front which
he visited there was a craze for writing
verse extending from the General to the
Red Army men. Russian novelists and
playwrights can always count on a host
of critical letters from the front after their
works have been published in the newspapers. The power of the word is strong, and
the meetings before battle, at which commanders and their political assistants address the men, have a profound effect. Ilya
Ehrenburg, by far the most popular writer
in the Army, tells how in a region controlled by partisans there was a rule that people using a newspaper to roll cigarettes
should avoid using the column containing
his articles, and that the Ehrenburg article
has in some places become a kind of currency, with a high value in kind.
The growth of patriotism has been
striking; today patriotic motives are probably more outspokenly expressed in the
songs and literature of the Red Army than
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02.43
distinguished itself would be difficult to
say. In the battles of Brest-Litovsk, Smolensk, Leningrad, and Moscow, in defence of Odessa, Sebastopol, Voronezh,
and Stalingrad, such qualities have been
drawn from the Red Army's fighters that
the world has sometimes forgotten that
these are men like other men, and now
that the fierce perils and scarcely imagined hardships of the Russian winter are
being overcome with greater tenacity even
than a year ago, and the Red Army is advancing faster over the snow than did the
Wehrmacht over the brazen steppes last
summer, it is no less difficult to see the
Red Army man in his true, natural, human
proportions.
208
anywhere else in the world. Some of the
rousing marching songs you hear on the
lips of Russian soldiers and sailors have
the sturdy quality of “Hearts of Oak” and
“John Brown’s Body.” It is significant that
of all British poets Rudyard Kipling is the
one most read at present in the Red Army.
In a dug-out under the banks of the Volga
at Stalingrad where I lodged, and where till
a few days previously a group of young officers of Rodimtsev’s 13th Guards Division
were quartered, there was also a number
of political pamphlets and a one-volume
edition of the freedom-loving spokesman
of the nineteenth-century Russian peasant, Asov.
A LAND TO FIGHT FOR
There has been no revival of “flagwagging” patriotism. Rather has it been a discovery of all that is valuable and significant for
the present time in Russia’s heroic past, and
the men who are fighting for the federation
of Socialist republics have been made conscious that behind them, as they take their
places in the trenches and gun emplacements, lie not only the great factories on
the slopes of the Urals and wide cultivated
plains in Siberia, Moscow with its still incomplete planning a host of new cities beside the
rivers, and on the forest edge of buoyant, aspiring dogged workers and farmers of contemporary Russia, but also the cathedrals
and the Kremlin and ancient tulip-domed
churches; poets, musicians, and novelists,
and those who fought for a land ordered by
justice and reason, knowing no slavery – a
Russia ever renewing herself by the fruitful
talent of her much-enduring people.
It was in the period of retreat that the
Red Army man learned to know how dear
his land was to him. “It is a fact, Comrade Commissar,” says the hero of that
remarkable interpretation of the Red Army’s mood during the 1941 retreat, Vassili
Grossman’s “The People Immortal”; “It is
as if I have become a different person in
this war; only now have I seen Russia honestly. You walk along and you become so
sorry for every river, every bit of woodland
that your heart aches. Life was not always
easy for the people, but then the difficulty was their own and ours. To-day I was
walking along a glade and there a tree was
rustling and trembling. It suddenly hurt me
as if something was tearing at me. Can it
really be that this little tree will go to the
Germans? I thought.”
This is no idealization of the Red Army
man. It happened that that long desperate withdrawal through the Ukraine and
Byelorussia took place during a summer
of unwonted beauty and abundance, and
as the heavy boots trampled down the ungathered harvest and rain pattered steadily down, as the shells shattered the trunks
of the maple trees in the primeval forests,
and the Germans rode roughshod through
the orchards of black cherry, tearing down
the white Ukrainian cottages where flow-
HATRED OF INTRUDER
He discovered his love for his country
and hatred of the intruder, so that when he
saw cities with gleaming white churches
and broad rivers down which rafts used
to swing lazily, crooked streets where ancient crafts were preserved, cities where
tens of thousands of women and children
slept; when he saw these things thoroughly and meticulously destroyed by German
aeroplanes, and when he saw the whole
peaceful economy of the land poignarded
by a sudden German attack which spared
neither woman nor child, he swore never
to forget how he hated the enemy.
The hatred which has grown perfectly
naturally out of the Red Army soldier’s
love of his own country has continued to
possess him ever since, but it would be a
misjudgment of the Russian character to
imagine that it has turned him into a demoniac, bloodthirsty soldier. That is how
Goebbels, in his guilt, is trying to paint
him to the world, and indeed the guilty
can expect no mercy at his hands. But to
those of us who see them in Russia these
earnest, frowning soldiers, disciplined but
not cowed, absorbed in the art of fighting
but remaining the impulsive, generoushearted Russians of history, are men as
we know men in Britain and America. The
order in which they place the things they
value in life is a little different from ours,
but to the eternal values of love of one’s
fellow man and love of country and family
they are no less loyal.
TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENTS
Alongside with the development in
the Red Army man’s character during
the war important technical developments have occurred, partly because of
the changeover from active defence to
the offensive, and partly because of the
effect of battle experience on the Army.
No fewer than 70 rifle divisions have been
converted into divisions of guards, and a
correspondingly high number of tank brigades, cavalry corps, artillery regiments,
and aviation formations. These units are
trained for attack, and whereas, since the
first onslaught on Russia, the Wehrmacht
has produced no new tactics of any note,
these crack Russian troops have devised
much that is new and bewildering to the
German command, who are trying to determine the character of the commander
opposing them and find something diffused and hazy.
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02.43
ers ran riot and sunflowers stared and
nodded, the Red Army man learned to feel
that this was his Russia and his blood ran
cold to think that the intruder could remain
here. The vision came to him in different
ways – perhaps as he lay with his face
pressed to the earth waiting for the red
flare that would beckon him into counterattack, Iying there drawing in the fragrance
of the soil and discovering all Russia in a
patch of wood-land; or perhaps when he
drove a tank through an abandoned village, overtaking carts full of stern, upright
old women and querulous, bewildered
children, with sacks of hastily gathered
effects, leaving homes where since times
forgotten there had breathed an atmosphere of quiet routine labour; or when,
standing amid the hemp on a reconnoitring patrol, he watched Germans making
themselves at home before a Byelorussian
cottage, carelessly beckoning to little girls
to bring them water from the well and tearing down boughs in the cherry orchard.
210
It may be in the development of independent mixed columns, or in the use of
regimental artillery hauled by men into the
front lines and using anti-personnel shells
at close and unexpected range, or in the
mobility of sledge-mounted equipment, or
in some other recent development in the
Red Army that success lies. The Red Army
has learned much during the war; not only
how to defend itself against the intricacies
of modern German warfare, the three-dimensional warfare of aircraft, tanks, and
parachute landings, and combined thrusts
of dynamic manoeuvre, but how to master
the enemy in attack.
The learning period was one of stern,
strict self-criticism. The Supreme Command has unhesitatingly carried out farreaching reorganizations, and the men
have been called on to undergo the most
intensive and most realistic training that
any army ever had. But the same absorption in the task of seeking knowledge,
which is a feature of Soviet civil life, has
pervaded the Army. Though there are
probably fewer unanswered questions in
the Red Army man’s mind than in that of
his British or American comrades, questions about their countries’ future, the
welfare of their dependents, and their
Government’s policy, his concentration
on self-improvement as a fighting man is
no less. The Red Army is a thinking army,
in whose minds you find the unquenchable curiosity of Russian people as you
find their richness of talent and their
great-heartedness. Proud indeed may the
Soviet Union be to-day of its sons who
fight so nobly, simply, and thoughtfully on
the vast battlefields.
The Times, February 22, 1943
Russia’s Military
Efficiency
THE BEST OF PAST
AND PRESENT
FROM OUR MILITARY
CORRESPONDENT
The Red Army has now been in existence for a quarter of a century. It is celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of its
birth in the midst of a campaign which has
already achieved resounding victories,
and is maintaining its initiative in a manner
which is astonishing the world – the hostile
world as well as the friendly. It has attained
its present amazingly high efficiency in
spite of misfortunes, losses, and sufferings which would have destroyed any military instrument possessing less vitality or
not based upon a vital national spirit.
Spirit and armament are closely allied.
Dash and initiative are linked, as they must
be if they are to survive, with tremendous
hitting power. The liaison between all arms
and services has been solidly forged. Lessons have been fully absorbed. The inefficient and the out-of-date, whether commanders or tactics, have been discarded.
Behind the fighting forces is working an
administrative machinery, improvised in its
details but long thought out and prepared
in its framework and material, such as has
never previously been conceived for a
winter campaign. Months ago, for example, the sleigh transport, in various forms,
which is now in use was being got ready
for this hour. All that we have written of
the handicaps of winter has been largely
belied by the extraordinary resource of
in the Albert Hall, where Mr. Eden, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, spoke. Mr.
Eden said –
This week our allies, the people of the
U.S.S.R., celebrate the-twenty-fifth anniversary of the foundation of their heroic
army. His Majesty’s Government have
asked me to come to this celebration to
pay their tribute and also, I know, the tribute of British people everywhere, to the
valour of the Red Army.
During the long and anxious months
of retreat our admiration and our sympa-
The Times, February 22, 1943
thy went out in full measure to the men of
this army in their dogged, unbroken resistance. To-day they reap at last the reward
of their bitter struggle. We share their rejoicing that the tide has turned, and is
sweeping forward in a surge of breathless
victories. Never in all its long, proud history has the German army sustained such
an unmitigated disaster as the Red Army
has inflicted upon it in the Battle of Stalingrad. Hitler has been out-generalled, outmanoeuvred, and out-fought.
We have had one bit of really good
news lately. It was with a feeling of deep
relief that we all read that Hitler was to
HEROIC SOVIET
FORCES
BRITISH PEOPLE’S TRIBUTE
MR. EDEN ON FUTURE UNITY
The twenty-fifth anniversary of the
foundation of the Red Army was celebrated in this country during the week-end.
At many of the meetings speeches were
made by members of the Government.
The principal meeting in London was held
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02.43
the Red Army, its leaders, its staff, and its
troops.
At the same time the consciousness
of Russian history and tradition has been
fostered as it could only have been in a
unified nation. The Red Army can afford
now to delve into the Russian past as it obviously could not 25 years ago in a divided
nation. The names of Suvorov and Kutuzov, faithful servants of their Tsars, have
come again into prominence. At least one
Tsar, Peter, has been recalled.
The status of the officer has been
raised, though he is still the companion
of his men, as, indeed, he was in the best
regiments of the older Russian armies.
The Russians have taught the modem military world a profound lesson: that when
great forces are assembled for war discipline is an aid to cohesion and to fortitude:
that smartness encourages self-respect.
Thus the Red Army has taken the best
out of the past to mingle with the best of
the present. It has brought in tradition to
aid the ruthless efficiency of the war of machines. It is not only a great modern army
but also essentially a Russian Army.
212
continue to control the German war machine. We have not forgotten, and the
Russian people will not forget, the boasts
of our common enemy. As long ago as the
autumn of 1941 we were assured that the
Soviet armies had been destroyed, indeed
annihilated. Only five months ago Hitler
pledged his word to the German people
that his troops would take Stalingrad. Today the armies of the Soviet Union have
forced him to stand before Germany as
the man who is personally responsible for
the slaughter of over a quarter of a million
of the best of his own troops. For it is Hitler’s intuition which has broken his army
on the rock of Soviet determination and
Soviet gallantry.
GERMANY TAUGHT DEFEAT
In three months the Red Army has
reconquered all the territory wrested from
it by the Germans during the summer of
last year, and more besides. Much more
besides, for the Red Army has driven into
the minds of the German people the lesson that German troops can be defeated
and hurled into the confusion of retreat.
We are proud that our own Eighth Army
has taught Rommel that lesson too. Hitler’s Grand Army, like Napoleon’s, has
found that there is a deadly risk in a trial
of strength against Russian patriotism,
against the Russian people’s capacity to
endure the sternest sacrifice, against the
great spaces of the Russian motherland.
On this anniversary occasion we pay
tribute to every department of the Red
Army, to the High Command, under the
supreme direction of Mr. Stalin himself,
for their masterly strategy, to the Generals
in the field for its brilliant execution, to the
junior officers of every rank for their gallant
and skilled leadership of the troops, to the
non-commissioned officers and men for
their stubborn endurance in adversity and
the ardour with which they have swung
over to the offensive. To the gallant men
of the Red Air Force, and to all those responsible for overcoming the appalling difficulties of communication and supply. Not
least, I think, this country would wish to pay
tribute to the deathless courage of the guerrilla forces of the Soviet Union. And here let
me add one other tribute which is of a domestic character – to the men of the Royal
Navy and the Merchant Marine, who, in all
seasons and in all weathers, have braved
when we stood between him and the dominion of the world, turned upon the Soviet
Union and in cold blood, without even the
formality of an ultimatum, attacked the nation with whom he had pledged friendship
less than two years before. Hitler and his
butcher followers who have slaughtered
hundreds of thousands of innocent Czechs
and Poles, Greeks, Norwegians, Yugoslavs, Dutch, Belgians, Frenchmen, and
Russians. Hitler the ravager of Warsaw, of
Rotterdam, Belgrade, and Coventry, and of
countless Russian cities. Hitler the apostle
of the doctrine of Herrenvolk, the doctrine
that all Europe must slave and starve for
the German overlord. Hitler who has abolished the rule of law even in his own land.
There is only one way that this man can
save mankind. Let him lead this monstrous
Nazi machine which he created to utter destruction, and let him become for his own
Germany and for the world such an awful
monument to evil-doing and evil-thinking
that men will be forever warned to combine
in time to prevent the rise of such another.
A FIRM ALLIANCE
The latest phase of German propaganda
has another theme, “Hold on a little longer,
and the Anglo-Saxons and the Russians
will fall out.” As you all know, that hope has
been dashed already. In May last we signed
here in London the Anglo-Soviet Treaty of
Alliance. We are not only agreed to work
together for the utter destruction of the Axis
in war, we are agreed on the broad principles which will underlie our collaboration in
peace. We are agreed to build up a post-war
system which shall be the negation of all that
Hitler’s “new order” stands for.
Hitler’s enemies are indeed the United
Nations. Premier Stalin himself on Novem-
213
02.43
the perils of that northern route to carry munitions and supplies of all kinds to our Russian allies. Proudly have they maintained
the bravest British traditions of the sea.
We recognize in the successful defence
of their motherland by the Red Army the
triumph of a nation united against the aggressor. We recognize the spirit of the Soviet peoples as akin to that which filled the
hearts of everyone in these islands when,
after Dunkirk, the enemy challenged our
own determination never to submit, though
we stood alone.
But here I must utter a word of warning.
Where Hitler’s generalship has failed, the
wiles of Goebbels are now in play. Every effort has been made and will be made to foster
suspicion and to encourage dissension between the allies. All the old paraphernalia is
out again. A part in this puppet show is played
by the bogy of Bolshevism. Fortunately we
do not find it hard to recognize this highly
coloured figure. He is an old friend, a survival
from the earliest days of the Nazi regime.
A good deal of the sawdust has run out
of him, and he does not answer very convincingly to the manipulation of Goebbels,
but still it is as well to recall his record. He
was used to frighten Europe while Austria
was seized, while Czechoslovakia was
swallowed and Poland threatened. Poland,
to her eternal glory, refused to submit. Now
this Red bogy is out again in the company
of another figure. We are asked to contemplate Hitler as the saviour of European
civilization. This figure Iacks something
in 1943. The population of the occupied
countries will find this prescription hard to
swallow, and the neutrals too. The saviour
of civilization – what a mockery!
Hitler, the only begetter of this hideous
war; Hitler who, having tailed to subdue us
in the long months of 1940 and early 1941,
214
ber 6 gave Hitler a direct answer on behalf
of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
He spoke of the coalition of this country,
the Soviet Union, and the United States,
which in spite of differences in ideology
and structure would fight against Hitler, the
common enemy. The people of this country accept that programme. We endorse
Mr. Stalin’s statement that the Anglo-Soviet Treaty marked a historic turning-point
in the relations between our two countries.
At this moment British and American
forces, the comrades of the Red Army,
with air and sea power, are lighting on the
shores of the Mediterranean to drive the enemy back to the continent of Europe, where
we are eager to strike home upon him. The
air forces of the allies are pounding with ever-increasing weight the factories and communications which supply the Axis forces.
To-day we salute the Red Army, the
true successors of those who fought
against the Teuton knights in the days of
Alexander Nevsky, against the would-be
conqueror Charles XII, against the Grand
Army of the Emperor Napoleon. We salute
and mourn their gallant dead. They have
died defending their motherland against
the most treacherous and ruthless of invaders, against the most awful menace
that has imperilled western civilization.
The victories of Stalingrad, Rostov, and
Kharkov are avenging them. We applaud
these glorious feats of arms. We look forward to the victories that are to come, to
the final victory that will be won together.
BRITAIN’S AID TO RUSSIA
The following are points from other
speeches made by Ministers: —
MR. A. V. ALEXANDER (at Bristol). —
Since September, 1942, to the end of January our submarines, surface vessels, aircraft, and recently American aeroplanes,
had sunk and damaged in the Mediterranean 248 ships of a gross tonnage of
626,000. From the beginning of October,
1941, to the end of last December the
United Kingdom had dispatched to Russia 2,974 tanks and 2,480 aircraft, while
aircraft sent by us outside the agreement
brought the figure to over 3,000.
MR. O. LYTTELTON (at Newcastle).
— Of nearly 250,000 tons of materials
promised at Moscow we had dispatched
190,000 tons before the end of last July.
From October, 1941, to the end of last
December we sent the initial equipment
for 32 armoured divisions in tanks and
400 squadrons of aircraft. With the United
States we had sent 85,000 trucks. Britain
sent 70,000,000 rounds of small arm ammunition and 50,000 tons of rubber.
MR. HERBERT MORRISON (at Brighton). — We had signed a 20-year treaty
with Russia. We knew that our association
with her was to be far more than a temporary military partnership.
SIR STAFFORD CRIPPS (at Sheffield). — Never have I doubted the capacity or the determination of the Soviet leaders. I was always confident that in the long
run they would be victorious.
MR. ATTLEE (at Cardiff). — It lies to
the credit of the Soviet military authorities
that they early grasped the need for education of the rank and file. They created
an army not of automatons but of thinking
men full of initiative. But training is nothing
without morale, and morale depends on a
faith in the cause for which men fight.
Contents:
The Greatest of all battles. By Natalia Narochnitskya……………………………………5
… And the headlines screamed. By Igor Nogaev…………………………………………7
The Battle of Stalingrad through the eyes of British and American newspapers……..39
The City
1942of Steel
1943
The Battle
of Stalingrad through
the eyes of British
and American
newspapers
Editorial Board:
Scientific Editor: Natalia Narochnitskaya
Elena Bondareva
Konstantin Kosachev
Igor Nogaev
Vladimir Romanov
Author: Igor Nogaev
Editor: Daria Karpukhina
Designer: Andrey Nikulin
The publication was prepared by:
The Foundation for Historical Outlook
[email protected]
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