138. Polyakova added that “these comrades became my first pupils and later some became my bosses.” Kochik, “Sovetskaia voennaia razvedka” (no. 9–12), 98.
139. In an earlier part of the discussion, a mid-level commander stated his uncertainty about whether he could speak about enemies of the people “in full voice.” Stalin: “To the whole world?” The commander: “No, internally.” Stalin: “You are obliged to do so.” Suvenirov, Tragediia RKKA, 93 (citing RGVA, f. 9, op. 29, d. 318, l. 173, 174, 64).
140. Solov’ev and Chugnuov, Pogranichnye voiska SSSR, 538–58, 574–7.
141. Beloff, Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia, II: 179–80; Ikuhiko, “Japanese-Soviet Confrontation,” 137–40.
142. Goldman, Nomonhan, 1939, 28–34 (quote on 31).
143. Coox, Nomonhan, 102–19 (quote at 116).
144. Taylor, Generalissimo (citing Chiang’s Diaries, Hoover Institution Archives, box 39, folder 13: July 12, 1937).
145. Jansen, Japan and China, 394–5.
146. The month before (June 1937), the Japanese completed the multiyear standardization of the railway gauge in northern China, converting from the wide gauge that the Russians had originally installed—just in time to move around their troops. Paine, Wars for Asia, 28.
147. Barnhart, “Japanese Intelligence,” 435.
148. Izvestiia, Aug. 30, 1937; DVP SSSR, XX: 466–8; Kurdiukov et al., Sovetsko-Kitaiskie otnosheniia, 161–2; Ledovskii et al., Russko-kitaiskie otnosheniia v XX veke, IV/i: 88–9 (APRF, f. 3–a, op. 1, d. 52, l. 1–3); Slavinskii, Sovetskii soiuz i kitai, 314–20. Dmitri Bogomolov, the Soviet envoy to China (since 1933), who signed the nonaggression pact, had been predicting there would be no full-scale Japanese attack on China. In July 1937, Litvinov rebuked him for supposedly implying to the Chinese that the Soviet Union might agree to a full alliance (a mutual assistance pact). In Sept., Stalin had Bogomolov recalled; he returned to Moscow on Oct. 7 and vanished. DVP SSSR, XX: 737–8 (July 19 and July 22, 1937); Ledovskii, “Zapiski diplomata,” 114; Sokolov, “Zabytyi diplomat”; Haslam, Struggle for Collective Security, 149.
149. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 21, l. 157; Bugai, “Vyselenie sovetskikh koreetsev,” 144.
150. FRUS, 1937, III: 636 (Bullitt to Washington, Oct. 23, 1937).
151. Chang and Halliday, Mao, 200–3.
152. The Soviets would extend $250 million in 1938–39; by mid-1939 there would be 3,665 Soviet advisers in China. Ageenko, Voennaia pomoshch’ SSSR, 49.
153. Whiting and Shih-ts’aicai, Sinkiang, 51 (citing memoirs of the general who ruled Xinjiang with Soviet backing).
154. Garver, “Chiang Kai-shek’s Quest.” Bogomolov called Chiang Kai-shek’s hopes for a direct Soviet-Japanese war his “idée fixe.” DVP SSSR, XX: 389. Chiang did not submit the nonaggression pact for formal ratification until April 26, 1938, indicating he wanted either a formal alliance or was waiting on the Western powers to change their minds.
155. Ledovskii et al., Russko-kitaiskie otnosheniia v XX veke, IV/i: 105–8 (APRF, f. 3, op. 1, d. 321, l. 10–15).
156. Stalin’s views on China in 1937 after the Japanese attack were recorded by Dimitrov: Banac, Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 67–9 (Nov. 11, 1937). Far more Soviet advisers and pilots would serve in China—3,665—than had served in Spain.
157. Barmin, Sovetskii Soiuz i Sin´tszian, 157–8.
158. Kolt’sov, Ispanskii dnevnik, 519–20 (July 7, 1937).
159. The other wife was Elizaveta Koltsova, who had been sacked in Madrid from her job. Kudriashov, SSSR i grazhdanskaia voina v Ispanii, 268 (APRF, f. 3, op. 65, d. 217, l. 68).
