262. Preemption bordered on the preposterous. The May 15 war plan envisioned 196 Soviet divisions concentrated in the West; as of June 22, first and second strategic echelons numbered 56 rifle and cavalry divisions on the western frontier and 52 at a distance of 60–250 miles from the frontier. Many of these divisions were under-strength in personnel and equipment. Moreover, whereas MP-41 stipulated 6.5 million troops in the west, on June 22 there were 3 million. In the Western special military district—“special” meant the district was supposed to be able to battle without added reserves—a significant number of Pavlov’s divisions were made up of reservists, who had almost no training; the district had only a single mechanized corps. It relied on the civilian communications network. It was expected to complete its combat preparations in the first half of 1942. Mawdsley, “Crossing the Rubicon,” 855; Zolotarev, Russkii arkhiv: Velikaia otechestvennaia, XII (I): 339–40 (RGVA, f. 4, op. 15, d. 27, l. 575–607); Gareev, Neodnoznachnaye stranitsy, 12; Murin, “Nakanune,” 10 (Vasilevsky); “GKO postanovliaet . . . ,” 20–1; Nekrich, Pariahs, 242–3. See also Nikulin, Tukhachevskii, 194. Soviet military districts were converted to “fronts” for war. This had happened on Sept. 11, 1939, for Poland (six days in advance); on Jan. 7, 1940, for Finland (in media res, reflecting the change in the war strategy); on June 9, 1940, for Bessarabia (nine days in advance); and in March 1941: northwest, west (central), and southwest. On May 27, Timoshenko would order that field command points be set up for the “fronts.” Vishlev, Nakanune, 29, 42–3; Vasilevskii, Delo vsei zhizni, 119.
263. One goal was to create a second strategic echelon along the Dnieper and Western Dvina Rivers but beyond the range of Luftwaffe aerial reconnaissance. (The first strategic echelon was already deployed within the boundaries of the frontier military districts at sixty or fewer miles from the border.) Gorkov, “Gotovil li,” 40–5; Zhukov, Vospominaniia, I: 345–6; Ivanov, Nachal’nyi period voiny, 211–2; Vasilevskii, Delo vsei zhizni, 114.
264. On the night and early morning of May 14–15, Stalin met with Timoshenko and Zhukov yet again, along with Kaganovich, railways commissar, a crucial aspect of mobilization. Na prieme, 333. Soviet railway capacity limits on mobilization were a long-standing subject of Soviet analysis. Naumov, 1941, god, I: 545–8 (RGAE, f. 1884, op. 49, d. 1247, l. 1–6: Jan. 17, 1941). On these problems in the Imperial Russian Army, see Fuller, Strategy and Power, 303–6. On May 24, Stalin gathered more than twenty military men and other officials in the Little Corner from around 6:00 p.m., for three and a half hours. Na prieme, 334. Almost no information on this meeting has been adduced by Soviet military historians with access to the archives. Even the politburo special files contain no information on what was discussed or decided. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 34–5. Stalin next saw Timoshenko and Zhukov in the Little Corner on June 3, and again on June 6, 7, 9, 11, 18, and 21. The regime sought to get this stance across in the provincial press and the Red Army’s army political-propaganda directorate. Golubev et al., Rossiia i zapad, 110 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 121, d. 128, l. 36). Vishnevsky had attended Stalin’s May 5 speech and the closed door sessions of the army political-propaganda directorate. He wrote in his diary (May 13, 1941): “the struggle against Germany,” . . . “against fascism, against the most dangerous military neighbor, in the name of revolutionizing Europe and, of course, Asia.” Vishnevsky also mentioned Stalin’s words at the Tajik banquet (April 22): “about Lenin, about a new ideology, about the brotherhood of peoples, about the ruinous and dead ideology of racism.” Golubev et al., Rossiia i zapad, 118 (citing RGALI, f. 1038, op. 1, d. 2079, l. 31).
265. Gavrilov, Voennaia razvedka informiruet, 628–9 (TsAMO, f. 23, op. 24119, d. 4, l. 435).
266. Meissner, Staatssekretär unter Ebert, Hindenburg, Hitler.
267. Berezhkov, S diplomaticheskoi missiei, 73; Berezhkov, At Stalin’s Side, 53; AVPRF, f. 082, op. 23, p. 95, d. 6, l. 141–2 (Nov. 19, 1940); Barros and Gregor, Double Deception, 150–9.
