188. Stalin was sent the report the next day. Naumov, 1941 god, II: 130 (TsA SVR, d. 23078, t. 1, l. 349–51). “Elder” had asserted (April 17) that two groups existed, one, led by Göring, champing at the bit to attack the USSR, the other, led by Ribbentrop, dead-set against. This was likely true at the time. Naumov, 1941 god, II: 90 (TsA SVR RF, d. 23078, t. 1, l. 269–74). Hitler seems to have taken Ribbentrop into full confidence on Barbarossa only in April 1941. Weizsäcker would claim that he finally got Ribbentrop to admit it to him on April 21, in Vienna. Nonetheless, the foreign minister gave Weizsäcker approval to compose a memorandum, on April 28, stating that delivering a death blow to the Communist system was not in itself a necessary goal. “Only one thing is decisive: whether this undertaking would hasten the fall of England.” The memo further asserted that Britain was already close to collapse. “A German attack on Russia would only give a lift to English morale,” the memo predicted. “It would be evaluated there as German doubt of the success of our war against England. We would in this fashion not only admit that the war would still last a long time, but we could in this way actually lengthen instead of shorten it.” Weizsäcker, Memoirs, 246–7; Davidson, Trial of the Germans, 154–5.
189. Van Creveld, Hitler’s Strategy. Hitler would also shift the main thrust, ordering that following the seizure of Belorussia, Army Group Center was to pause to take the Baltics, resuming the advance on Moscow only after Leningrad and Kronstadt had been captured. He argued that it was necessary to cut the Russians off from the Baltic Sea, to deny them imports, but he envisioned the creation of a Greater Finland as well. Warlimont, Inside Hitler’s Headquarters, 138.
190. Naumov, 1941 god, II: 129–30 (TsA SVR, d. 23078, t. 1, l. 352–5).
191. Gavrilov, Voennaia razvedka informiruet, 518.
192. Völkishcher Beobachter, May 5, 1941. A Russian translation of Hitler’s May 4 Reichstag speech was conveyed to Soviet front line military districts on June 10, 1941. TsAMO, f. 32, op. 11 306, d. 5 (Volkogonov papers, Hoover, container 7). Colonel Kuznetsov writes that when he reported to the deputy head of the tank forces in the general staff (Panfilov) on German force concentration, “Panfilov said to me that we are being subject to disinformation, adding that only a few minutes ago Comrade Stalin had phoned and said, ‘the Germans want to frighten us, at the current time they will not move against us, they themselves are afraid of the USSR.’” Naumov, 1941 god, II: 476 (note to CC department head Silin, Aug. 15, 1941).
193. “Mars” reported out of Budapest (May 1) that German forces were leaving Belgrade for Poland, and that German troops were talking about “the inevitability of war against the USSR in the nearest term.” Naumov, 1941 god, II: 150 (TsAMO, f. 23, op. 24119, d. 4, l. 381); Gavrilov, Voennaia razvedka informiruet, 613. On May 5, “Yeshenko” from Bucharest reported on conversations by “ABC” that German forces were being relocated from the Balkans to Romania and the Soviet frontier, as well as many other signs of impending war. Gavrilov, Voennaia razvedka informiruet, 612–4 (TsAMO, f. 23, op. 24119, d. 1, l. 737–40, 744–5).
194. DGFP, series D, 723-5 (Ott, May 6). See also Sipols, Tainy, 392. On May 17, Weizsäcker misinformed Japanese ambassador Ōshima that “German-Russian relations were unchanged,” and that it was wrong to characterize them as “in a state of tension.” Sontag and Biddie, Nazi-Soviet Relations, 342. See also Trial of the Major War Criminals, XII: 165 (“The Ministries’ Case”).
