Myth #170: In the early 1950s, Stalin unleashed a war on the Korean Peninsula.
Over the past twenty years, this insufferably idiotic myth has become extremely widespread. It's been used by everyone in futile attempts to prove Stalin's super-aggressive expansionist ambitions. And it's all in vain. And it couldn't have been otherwise. Because Stalin didn't display any ambitions at the time, let alone super-aggressive or expansionist ones. Especially not with regard to Korea. But how can you explain this to "democratic" historians and journalists?! They need a Western perspective—in the minds of these intellectual wretches, it's the only "ultimate truth." Well, this time, I'll give it a try. With the help of contemporary American researcher K. Weathersby, author of the excellent book "Soviet Objectives in Korea, 1945–1950// The Cold War." Moscow, 1995.
Based on a meticulous study of new documents, including those classified until the 1990s, K. Weathersby has reached the following categorical conclusion. The widespread belief that the Soviet leadership, primarily Stalin, was interested in and therefore pushed North Korea to invade the south with the goal of unifying the country, expanding the USSR's sphere of influence, and pushing back the United States, does not correspond to the realities of the time. Even during World War II, the Soviet Union made significant concessions to the United States regarding Korea's postwar fate. Moreover, it agreed with all American proposals on this matter. K. Weathersby provides evidence that Stalin had no claims on South Korea. In the name of maintaining allied relations, he even refused to assist the South Korean Communist Party in the American occupation zone. The American researcher convincingly demonstrates, using documents and facts, that Stalin was clearly limited to a dual goal:
- maintain the established balance of power among the allies in Korea
— maintain tight control over North Korea, which would play the role of a buffer state capable of protecting the USSR's border in this region, as well as being a source of certain industrial resources, primarily uranium ore.
K. Weathersby clearly demonstrates that Stalin stubbornly restrained Kim Il-sung from marching south due to fears that a local war would escalate into a new world war and agreed with Kim Il-sung to military action against South Korea at Mao Zedong's request, seeking to avoid accusations of "holding back the cause of revolution in the East." According to Weathersby, Stalin did not want the USSR to participate in military operations even after the Americans entered the war and the North Koreans suffered major defeats. Weathersby notes that Stalin "even angrily rejected Khrushchev's proposal to send a Russian general to organize effective resistance. The Soviet leader sought to avoid the risk of a direct confrontation between the USSR and the United States. At the same time, he did not want to lose North Korea. When Stalin was informed on October 2 that Mao had decided to send troops to Korea to aid Kim, he was overjoyed that the Chinese had helped resolve his dilemma."
Having studied a wealth of previously unavailable documents, K. Weathersby has clearly and unequivocally demonstrated that Stalin's policy toward Korea was characterized by exceptional caution. The American researcher's final conclusion sounds like a harsh death sentence to all the foolish talk about Stalin's hyper-aggressive expansionist aspirations in Korea: "Stalin's goals were very far from the unbridled expansionism that Western leaders attributed to him!"
Incidentally, exactly the same conclusion was reached regarding Stalin's policy in China. At an international conference in Hong Kong in 1996, documents convincingly demonstrated that, in the interests of world peace, Stalin did not support Mao Zedong's request to expedite the armed seizure of Taiwan!
This is the real truth about how, supposedly, "guided by ultra-aggressive expansionist considerations and ambitions, Stalin unleashed a war on the Korean Peninsula in the early 1950s"! And, most importantly in this case, this real truth is accurately documented by a representative of the very country that most and consistently accused Stalin of pursuing an aggressive foreign policy!
Myth #171: Due to personal animosity and serious ideological differences, Stalin ordered the assassination of Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito in 1952.
Frankly, this isn't a myth per se. In this case, the truth coexists with a highly sophisticated, unprecedentedly carefully concealed lie and deliberate falsifications. The opportunity to formulate this myth arose primarily because Soviet intelligence was unable to declassify its data related to this case for a long time.
One of the authors of this libel, myth, or who knows what else, was N.S. Khrushchev. At the 20th Congress of the CPSU, he blurted out from the podium that Stalin, supposedly having lost all sense of reality toward the end of his life, once declared, "I only have to lift my little finger, and Tito will be no more." This, of course, is utter nonsense. Stalin was an extremely experienced political statesman of global stature, and therefore had neither the habit nor the inclination to make such daring statements.
As for ideological differences, the following should be kept in mind. They did indeed exist, and were even quite intense. Often, this even resulted in personal insults in the press. The author once happened to see a 1952 issue of the legendary Soviet-era magazine "Krokodil" with a caricature of Tito, depicting him as practically a fascist, holding a bloody axe. But believe me, that's not the whole point of Stalin's order. More precisely, the whole point of this order lies in what is never said out loud and what—true paradox of paradoxes—was never hidden. This is precisely what will be discussed below.
Regarding Stalin's order to liquidate Tito, he must say that he actually gave it. Moreover, for the significant delay in carrying out this order, some in the intelligence leadership were reprimanded. All this really happened. Now delve into the essence of why such an order was given. This will also answer the question about the nature of the disagreements that arose between Stalin and Tito.
Typically, the narrative surrounding this story begins with the bitter disagreement between Stalin and Tito, which took place back in 1948, over the creation of a federation of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. The theory is that Tito refused to support the idea of such a federation, and Stalin, unaccustomed to opposition, lost his temper. And then everything spiraled out. It's all nonsense. Except for one thing—the mention of the idea of creating a federation of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. Now let the intelligence data from that time speak for itself. For only then can we understand the essence of how Stalin came up with this idea, and consequently why he became so angry with Tito when the latter refused to support it.
Beginning in mid-1947, Soviet foreign intelligence began regularly gathering information about attempts by Western powers, primarily the United States and Great Britain, to create a Mediterranean military bloc aimed against the Soviet Union. These attempts boiled down to plans to create an "Entente in the eastern Mediterranean, directed against Slavic expansion." Why would the Anglo-Saxons even imagine "Slavic expansion"?!
Be that as it may, it was precisely this circumstance that first inspired Stalin to conceive of the idea of creating a federation of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. Stalin had no intention of losing Soviet influence in the Balkans, where Russia's role had historically been particularly significant. A federation could have become a defensive outpost for the Soviet Union on the distant approaches to this region. Two terrible world wars, in which the Balkans played a crucial role, left no room for the Soviet leadership to respond to Western powers' attempts to create a Mediterranean military bloc. And when Tito refused to support the idea of a federation of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia, Stalin had more than good reason to be furious.
Firstly, it was Soviet troops who liberated Yugoslavia and practically all of the Balkans (Romania, Bulgaria), and Stalin had no intention of losing the fruits of this Soviet military victory. Secondly, Tito owed his life personally to Stalin—after all, when the Nazis cornered him in the Drvar Gorge during the war, only Soviet pilots, on Stalin's orders, rescued Tito, escaping literally under the Nazis' noses. Stalin was truly stung by Tito's base ingratitude, as well as his unwillingness to strengthen Slavic solidarity. However, all this mainly served only as an impetus for a sharp outburst of ideological differences and an equally sharp cooling of interstate and interparty relations.
Soviet military and civilian advisers were recalled from Yugoslavia, and at a meeting of the Information Bureau (the successor to the Comintern, dissolved in 1943) held in Bucharest in June 1948, A.A. Zhdanov read out a report, “On the situation in the Communist Party of Yugoslavia,” in which Stalin personally wrote the following:
"Tito, Kardelj, Djilas, and Ranković bear full responsibility for the current situation. Their methods are from the arsenal of Trotskyism. The policy in the city and village is wrong. The Communist Party will not tolerate this shameful, purely Turkish terrorist regime. This regime must end."
Although these circumstances are very important, nevertheless they are not the main ones.
The fact is that as the information about the US and Great Britain's attempts to create a Mediterranean military bloc mounted, it became increasingly Yugoslav in nature. Both sides were actively trying to draw Yugoslavia into the future bloc. Consequently, Tito's refusal to support the idea of a federation between Bulgaria and Yugoslavia literally forced Stalin to suspect Tito of double dealing, naturally to the detriment of the Soviet Union.
But what most alarmed the Soviet leadership at the time was that this emphasis emerged against the backdrop of a fierce behind-the-scenes struggle between the United States and Great Britain for control of the future Mediterranean military bloc. Actively attempting to draw Yugoslavia into the future bloc, the United States and Great Britain offered Tito various terms for membership. As a result, the impression arose that Tito had not simply abandoned Stalin's proposal but was also choosing which option would be more advantageous for him in joining an alliance with Western countries. This impression was further reinforced by the fact that, since the war, Stalin had been well aware of Tito's confidential contacts with British intelligence officials.
By early 1952, a situation had developed where Soviet intelligence presented Stalin with compelling evidence that Belgrade was, in essence, conducting some kind of bargaining with the leading Western powers, both directly and through intermediaries. Thus, Soviet intelligence informed Stalin of confidential visits to Belgrade for talks with Tito by the US Secretary of Defense, as well as prominent US and British statesmen and politicians, A. Harriman and A. Eden. A secret report obtained by Soviet intelligence from the Italian ambassador to Washington on the results of A. Harriman's visit stated:
"The United States would have been satisfied with any option that would have allowed it to exercise effective control over Yugoslavia and fully utilize its potential in a manner that would not have threatened the Yugoslav government with an internal crisis or provided serious grounds for the open manifestation of a leftist opposition within the country." But "any option for effective control" over Yugoslavia was precisely what Stalin needed! Because had such an idea been implemented, the USSR would have had Washington's "Trojan horse" right in the Balkans. And what did the USSR, concerned about its own security, need? After all, the United States, with its bloc strategy, was already establishing military bases along the perimeter of the Soviet border.
Almost simultaneously, Stalin was presented with information regarding the contents of secret probing talks between the Turkish Foreign Minister and the Yugoslav ambassador in Paris. Specifically, it was established that the Turkish Foreign Minister had argued to the Yugoslav ambassador the benefits of participating in the "continuous Alps-Dardanelles front," designed to protect the Mediterranean from the Soviet Union. Again, I cannot resist commenting on the actions of the Turkish Foreign Minister. By that time, Turkey was already a NATO member and, accordingly, was following the orders of the North Atlantic bloc's leaders. At that time, Turkey pursued a policy strictly dependent on the West, primarily the United States, and therefore showed no initiative. This was a direct order from the United States and NATO. However, why did the North Atlantic rulers and their Turkish lackey imagine a Soviet threat in this area? After all, it was not the Soviet Union that developed plans to attack the West, but the West, due to its pathological hatred of Russia, even in the person of the USSR, that developed such plans.
A little later, Soviet intelligence informed Stalin of Italy's particularly jealous interest in participating in attempts to draw Yugoslavia into the Mediterranean military-political bloc.
Having summarized all the data, in mid-1952, intelligence sent Stalin a special message. It stated that "in order to strengthen the anti-Soviet bridgehead in the Mediterranean, US leadership circles are currently attempting to create, alongside the Middle East Command, a military-political bloc comprising Yugoslavia, Greece, and Turkey, in which Italy, other Mediterranean countries, and Austria could also participate." The special message emphasized that the creation of a military-political bloc in the Balkans, closely linked to NATO, would allow the Americans to strengthen their strategic positions near the People's Democracies and the southern regions of the USSR. The document further noted that the United States intended to link the newly created military-political bloc with the North Atlantic Alliance and assign it some of that alliance's tasks in the southern European strategic direction. The special message also stated that General Eisenhower had held a series of talks with the leaders of Greece and Turkey on the creation of the bloc, during which the most appropriate forms of incorporating Yugoslavia were discussed.
All of this posed a colossal threat to the security of the USSR and its allied people's democracies. That's why, even when information first surfaced about US and British attempts to create a Mediterranean military-political bloc as a means of actively countering such plans, Stalin proposed the idea of creating a federation of Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. Tito's refusal to support this plan aroused Stalin's serious suspicions of duplicity on the part of the Yugoslav leader, especially since Joseph Vissarionovich was well aware, I emphasize again, of Tito's confidential contacts with British intelligence dating back to the war. Britain has historically "shepherded" this vital region of the world.
When attempts to gain Tito's consent were finally thwarted by his stubbornness, and intelligence reported that "the United States would be satisfied with any option that would allow for effective control over Yugoslavia and the full exploitation of its potential in a manner that would not threaten the Yugoslav government with an internal crisis or provide serious grounds for the open manifestation of a leftist opposition in the country," Stalin's patience, apparently, snapped. A strict order was issued to eliminate Tito. The situation offered no other chance for a more gentle means of removing him from power. Neither foreign policy nor domestic policy. The foreign policy aspect has just been discussed above. As for the domestic aspect, that is, the internal Yugoslav issue, here's the point. The operation to eliminate Tito was complicated by the fact that the counterintelligence department of the Yugoslav State Security Directorate (UDB), headed by General J. Šašić, had eliminated virtually all Soviet intelligence agents within the country. Yugoslavia's military attaché in Moscow, General B. Polyanec, and his staff—UBB officers M. Perović, S. Pavic, and S. Stoilković—were arrested after being recruited by the USSR MGB. A little later, General R. Žigić, head of the military department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Croatia; M. Kalafatić, deputy minister of heavy industry; I. Korda and A. Zoric, officers of the General Staff of the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia; N. Kovačević, D. Ozren, and A. Stumpf, employees of the Cominform apparatus; and a number of other Yugoslav communists who supported the Moscow line were arrested. In total, 29 Soviet agents were arrested in Yugoslavia between 1948 and 1953.
As a result, Soviet intelligence was forced to seek other ways to carry out the operation to assassinate Tito. By late autumn, a new plan had been developed involving agent "Max," an MGB undercover agent who had previously participated in the assassinations of A. Nin in Spain and L. Trotsky in Mexico. Agent "Max" was Iosif Romualdovich Grigulevich, a Soviet citizen. Much has been written about the organization of the operation to assassinate Tito involving this agent, as well as about the agent himself. The most recent book about Grigulevich, and also the best, is "Stalin's Superagent" (V.M. Chikov, Moscow, 2007). Therefore, we will not repeat ourselves. Those interested can also consult the memoirs of P.A. Sudoplatov.
Later, when the operation was cancelled following Stalin's assassination by Khrushchev and Co., I.R. Grigulevich became one of the leading Soviet historians, a specialist in the history of Latin America, as well as Catholicism and the history of the Vatican. In the USSR, there was no greater expert on this subject than he. He authored a number of brilliant books on the history of Catholicism, the Inquisition, the Jesuit Order, and other topics.
This is the truth about those events. Of course, some people won't be satisfied with it. However, I'd like to remind them of the following. Those were very different times. Questions of war and peace were decided with extreme brutality. Both by the West and the USSR. Neither the West nor the USSR were particularly shy about the means to eliminate threats to their security. Especially when there was even the slightest chance of "avoiding greater damage by causing lesser harm," which is typically characteristic of covert intelligence operations. So, there's absolutely no basis for blaming Stalin and his intelligence agencies. A war was waged against the USSR, and the fact that it was, you see, a cold war didn't make the Soviet Union any more comfortable. After the Great Patriotic War, everything related to national security was often done preemptively, with enormous reserves, and, I emphasize again, there was no particular shyness in the choice of means. Because on the other side of the barricades, no one was shy in their choice of means either.
Incidentally, even now, when Russia is ostensibly a democracy, when the "Soviet threat" that supposedly frightened Western leaders seems to have formally disappeared, they still operate as before, especially the Anglo-Saxons. They continue to resort to the most extreme methods, the most unacceptable even by the standards of their civilization's "universal values." Russia's intelligence services are constantly confronted with this even today. And not only confronted, but they respond appropriately to threats to Russia's security, including, if necessary, with extreme severity. There is no other way to defend the security, sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity of a Great Power. It's time for everyone to understand this simple truth.
And here's another thing. Although, as we know, Her Majesty History abhors the subjunctive mood, I will nonetheless venture the following point of view. I am convinced that had Tito been eliminated then, events in the Balkans, including Yugoslavia itself, would have unfolded along a more acceptable scenario for the peoples of that region. And, at the very least, such a terrible, bloody national catastrophe in Yugoslavia at the end of the 20th century would not have occurred, nor would there have been the Kosovo problem, for which Tito is personally responsible. After all, it was he who initiated the process of intensive settlement of the ancestral Serbian region of Kosovo—which, incidentally, has the same significance for Serbs as Kulikovo Field does for Russians—by Albanians who not only professed Islam but were also extremely hostile to Serbs. The fact is that, since the late 19th century, Albanians have been closely monitored by British intelligence, using them as a "Trojan horse" against the Slavic peoples of the Balkans. There are serious grounds to believe that Tito's plan to heavily populate Kosovo with Albanians, who have historically been universally inclined toward separatism, armed banditry, and criminal activity, was foisted upon him by British intelligence. The outcome is well known. And then, whether you like it or not, you can't help but regret that Tito wasn't eliminated in time...
Myth #172: At the end of the war, Stalin allowed Soviet pilots to attack Allied forces.
Previously little known in our country, this myth is highly significant, often resurfacing in Western historical writings to demonstrate the "cunning of ungrateful Russians." Well, they're certainly no strangers to slinging mud at former allies. But they lie, as they say in Rus', like skunks. Even worse. Because it wasn't the Russians who attacked the Allies at the end of the war, but the Allies who deliberately bombed Soviet troops.
The gist of the matter is this. On November 7, 1944, two groups of 25–30 American Lightning aircraft suddenly attacked moving columns of Soviet troops near the Yugoslav city of Niš, 84 km from Pristina (Kosovo, former Yugoslavia), as well as eight Yaks of the 866th Fighter Regiment that had scrambled to assist their troops. The regiment command ordered that all measures be taken to prevent a combat engagement with the Americans without using weapons. Unaware of the radio frequency of the American crews, our pilots tried every possible means in the air to show the Americans that they were attacking allied Soviet forces. However, despite the clearly visible red stars on the Soviet fighters, the Americans continued to stubbornly bomb the moving columns of the 37th Army of the 3rd Ukrainian Front, while also continuously strafing our fighters. During this American raid, combat general and corps commander G.P. Kotov was tragically killed.
At some point during the aerial carousel, all the planes became confused, and so it was never possible to determine what, how, or why happened. In any case, the pilots remained silent afterward. However, what they kept silent about was more than eloquent: after repeated exhortations in pilot language (wing oscillation, various aerobatic maneuvers, displaying stars on the planes), our planes wholeheartedly shot down six American planes. Upon examination of the crash site, it was discovered that both cities—Pristina and Niš—were marked as bombing targets on the American pilots' flight maps. In other words, the Americans had deliberately flown to bomb Soviet troops.
The incident, along with the recovered flight logs of the American pilots, was reported to Stalin. As a result, the commander of the Soviet fighter group, Captain (later Air Marshal) Alexander Ivanovich Koldunov, twice Hero of the Soviet Union, was decorated, as stated in official documents, for his courage and resourcefulness in a difficult situation. Incidentally, if the Americans hadn't been brought to their senses in this manner, the entire air regiment would have had to be scrambled, and then both groups of American aircraft would have been grounded. A larger clash with American forces, not to mention a serious international scandal, would have been inevitable.
However, a scandal did occur. In a personal message to American President Roosevelt, Stalin so vented his anger over this unprecedented outrage—after all, so many Soviet soldiers and officers had died for nothing, and enormous damage had been caused to Soviet military equipment—that President Roosevelt personally apologized to Joseph Vissarionovich in writing. The surviving correspondence between Stalin and Roosevelt still contains this apologetic letter from the American president. American generals were subsequently forced to apologize to the Soviet command.
Now compare Stalin's wise and just decision and his principled stance in relations with his allies with the Americans' vicious vindictiveness and Gorbachev's baseness. The Americans remembered that it was A.I. Koldunov who commanded the eight Soviet fighters that shot down six American aircraft. The decree awarding him was published in the press. And it would have been hard not to remember him. He was an outstanding Soviet ace, credited with 46 German aircraft shot down.
So, decades later, when Gorbachev, led by the Americans (and the British), sadly took over the USSR, at the instigation of those same Yankees, he brutally dealt with two-time Hero of the Soviet Union Alexander Ivanovich Koldunov, who by then was Commander-in-Chief of the USSR Air Defense Forces and an Air Marshal. This distinguished front-line soldier, a highly respected military specialist, beloved by the troops, was removed from his post without any explanation and sent into retirement, a retirement he didn't last very long. He "burned out" very quickly.
So Stalin gave no orders to bomb the Allies. Neither did the air regiment command. But our pilots were forced to take this step—shooting down American planes—because, despite the desperate attempts of our hawks to show the Yankees that they were bombing allied Soviet forces, they stubbornly continued their provocative bombing, even furiously strafing our fighters. Only the instantaneous downing of six planes had any effect on the remaining Yankee blockheads. That's the story. The Allies didn't want the Soviet Army to liberate Yugoslavia.
Myth #173. The deportation of Crimean Tatars, Chechens, Ingush, Kalmyks and others from their places of permanent residence at the end of the war was an act of Stalin's genocide of these peoples.
A complex of myths, insidiously inflated by so-called democracy, which, incidentally, is one of the favorites for whipping up anti-Stalin hysteria. It is often used not only for deliberately slanderous attacks on Stalin, but also to incite vicious nationalist separatism among some small nations. But what really happened?
In reality, the basis for such a harsh decision to deport and resettle some of the USSR's small peoples at the end of the war was the mass desertion of their representatives from the Red Army, their collaboration with the enemy, their mass defection to the enemy, their service in the ranks of the enemy's armed forces, their numerous acts of armed violence (including sabotage) behind their own country's lines, including against the Red Army's rearguard and wounded Red Army soldiers, including their massacre. This applies to Crimean Tatars, Crimean Armenians, Crimean Greeks, as well as Chechens, Ingush, and Kalmyks.
While the few sons of these peoples courageously fought against the hated enemy—after all, few know that among the heroic defenders of the Brest Fortress were, for example, many Chechens—almost the majority of these peoples, to their deep regret, chose the path of blatant betrayal. And betrayal has always been cruelly punished in all countries of the world, regardless of the regime. And this cruel punishment has always been the highest measure of justice. Try to find a single state in history or modern times that would turn a blind eye to betrayal, especially on a mass scale. Don't even look, because you won't find it. Nevertheless, the "democratic lament of Yaroslavna" on this subject continues unabated. As if those who frighten their contemporaries with the horrors of Stalin's deportations don't know or understand that they are talking about traitors. And the fact that this was mass betrayal is evidenced by the facts. According to data for 1939, for example, the following people lived in Crimea:
— Russians — 558,481 people, or 49.6% of the total population of Crimea;
— Ukrainians — 154,120 people (13.7%);
— Crimean Tatars — 218,179 people (19.4%);
- Germans - 51,299 people (4.6%);
— Jews — 65,452 people (5.8%);
— Bulgarians — 15,353 (1.4%);
- Greeks - 20,652 (1.8%);
— Armenians 12,873 (1.1%);
— others — 29,276 (2.6%). Total: 1,126,385 people.
At the beginning of the war, 90,000 Crimean people were conscripted into the Red Army, including 20,000 Crimean Tatars, who deserted without exception during the 51st Army's retreat from Crimea in 1941. For example, in the village of Koush alone, 120 of the 132 conscripts who joined the Red Army deserted. So, desertion among the Crimean Tatars was truly universal. And from desertion to servitude to the Nazi occupiers is less than half a step. Historians subsequently established that, according to rough estimates, over 20,000 Crimean Tatars served in the Wehrmacht units stationed in Crimea. Therefore, betrayal in the form of defecting to the enemy was also universal among the Crimean Tatars.
Of course, there were exceptions, but only those that confirmed the basic rule. As of June 1, 1943 , there were 262 men in the Crimean partisan detachments , but only 6 of them were Tatars, and 212 were Russians. According to Crimean archives, as of January 15, 1944, there were 3,733 partisans in Crimea, but only 598 of them were Tatars, and 2,292 were Russians. In April of that same year, 1944, the number of Tatars in the partisans even decreased—they numbered only 391 , while the number of Russians increased to 2,502 . A basic calculation shows that in 1943, 3,333 times more Crimean Tatars served in the German army than were partisans; in April 1944, when the Crimean Tatars finally began to think about the future, the number was still more than 51 times greater! Isn't this total betrayal?!
Is it any wonder, then, that the Presidium of the Muslim Committee issued an address on April 10, 1942, published in the newspaper Azat Krym (Free Crimea, published in German-occupied Crimea from 1942 to 1944): "To the liberator of oppressed peoples, the son of the German people, Adolf Hitler. We, Muslims, with the arrival in Crimea of the valiant sons of Greater Germany, with your blessing and in memory of our long-standing friendship, stood shoulder to shoulder with the German people, took up arms, and began to fight to the last drop of blood for the universal ideas you put forward—the complete and utter destruction of the red Jewish-Bolshevik plague. Our ancestors came from the East, and we awaited liberation from there, but today we are witnessing that liberation is coming to us from the West. Perhaps for the first and only time in history, the sun of freedom has risen from the west. This sun is you, our great friend and leader, with your mighty German people."
Well, as for the Crimean Tatars' "great friend and leader," Adolf Hitler, and his "mighty German people," the Soviet Army had fully dealt with them by May 9, 1945. But after such an appeal from the Crimean Tatars to Hitler, should we be surprised by the severity with which the Soviet government punished them? They more than deserved their harsh punishment. Everything was fair and just. Almost the entire Crimean Tatar people sided with the enemy, although there were rare exceptions. ( For example, one of the Heroes of the Soviet Union was the outstanding Crimean Tatar, a fighter pilot and later a test pilot, the famous Akhmet Khan. He will forever be remembered with gratitude by the Soviet people. But the Crimean Tatars don't hold his memory in high regard. They don't even hold their own outstanding thinker and philosopher, Ismail Gasprinsky, in high regard. And only because he advocated friendship with Russia!) That's why they received such harsh punishment. No country in the world tolerates betrayal, especially on such a massive scale. Severe punishment will inevitably befall traitors and betrayers. So they shouldn't have complained, much less portrayed themselves as unfortunate victims of Stalin's regime. Especially if you consider that they were only evicted, and not shot or slaughtered en masse, as they did with the Red Army soldiers, especially the wounded.
A brief comment. It's certainly interesting to note that the chatter about the notorious "universal values" packaged in Western terms began back then—in the guise of "universal ideas." In other words, the Presidium of the Muslim Committee, back then, in April 1942, laid bare what was happening before our eyes when they were trying to impose these notorious "universal values" on the entire world. Moreover, it turns out that the post-war "democratic" West simply stole the very idea of "universal values" from the Nazis!
After the liberation of Crimea from the Nazis, 5,995 rifles, 337 machine guns, 250 submachine guns, 31 mortars, and a huge quantity of grenades and ammunition were confiscated from the arrested German secret service agents, traitors, and other Crimean Tatar collaborators—a total of 5,381 people. During the deportation of the Crimean Tatars, additional weapons were seized: 49 mortars, 716 machine guns, 724 submachine guns, 9,888 rifles, and 5 million rounds of small arms ammunition. This amount of weapons would have been enough to equip at least two divisions according to wartime standards.
Could Stalin, in wartime, have left such a mass of armed bandits in the rear, especially those who relied on the massive support of the local Crimean Tatar population?! Especially considering that during their retreat, Hitler's command always sought to leave numerous armed bands behind to fight the Soviet Union. Of course not. No sane government leader would do such a thing. So there's no point in denigrating Stalin, especially since he dealt quite leniently with the Crimean Tatars—simply deporting them.
It was not without good reason that representatives of other nationalities inhabiting Crimea were also targeted. Here, for example, is what the NKVD reported to the Chairman of the State Defense Committee, I.V. Stalin, in May 1944:
"During the German occupation, a significant portion of the Bulgarian population actively participated in the procurement of grain and food for the German army, assisted the German military authorities in identifying and detaining Red Army soldiers and Soviet partisans, and received 'safe conduct' from the German command. The Germans organized police units of Bulgarians and also recruited Bulgarians for labor in Germany."
Just try to understand these "dear Slavic brothers"! But the Orthodox Greeks in Crimea behaved exactly the same way.
Local Armenians in Crimea behaved similarly. The Armenian Committee, created with the assistance of the occupiers, actively collaborated with the enemy and carried out extensive anti-Soviet activities. A German intelligence organization, "Dromedar," was even established in Simferopol, headed by former Dashnak General Dro Kanayan. The organization directed intelligence operations against the Red Army and, to this end, created several underground committees to conduct espionage and subversive activities behind Red Army lines, as well as to recruit for the volunteer Armenian Legion established by the Nazis. With the assistance of Armenian émigrés arriving from Berlin, the committee carried out propaganda for an "independent Armenia," while the local Armenian population assisted the Germans "by raising funds" for the military needs of Nazi Germany. These individuals, too, received harsh punishment for their "merits."
The Chechens and Ingush were no better off. Based on information gleaned from O.S. Smyslov's book, "The Cursed Legions: Traitors to the Motherland in Hitler's Service" (Moscow, 2006), the following should be noted first.
On November 9, 1943, the head of a special brigade of state security officers, Deputy People's Commissar of State Security, Second-Class Commissar B.Z. Kobulov, presented a report to Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria, "On the Situation in the Districts of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR," based on a survey and analysis of the operational situation in the autonomous republic. The report stated: "There are 2,288 settlements in the republic. The population has decreased by 25,886 people during the war and now stands at 705,814. Chechens and Ingush in the republic as a whole comprise approximately 450,000 people. There are 38 sects in the republic, numbering over 20,000 people. They are actively engaged in anti-Soviet work, harboring bandits and German paratroopers. As the front line approached in August-September 1942, 80 members of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) abandoned their jobs and fled, including 16 heads of district committees of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), 8 leading workers of district executive committees, and 14 chairmen of collective farms.
Anti-Soviet authorities, having contacted German paratroopers, on the instructions of German intelligence, organized an armed uprising in 1942 in the Shatoevsky, Cheberloevsky, Itumkalinsky, Vedensky and Galangozhsky districts.
The Chechen and Ingush attitude toward Soviet rule was clearly expressed in desertion and evasion of conscription into the Red Army. During the first mobilization in August 1941, 719 of the 8,000 men subject to conscription deserted. In October 1941, 362 of the 4,733 men evaded conscription. In January 1942, during the recruitment of a national division, only 50 percent of its personnel could be conscripted (a wartime rifle division had 14,833 men, meaning only 7,416 men could be recruited. – A.M.). In March 1942, 13,560 of the 14,576 men deserted and evaded service, going underground, fleeing to the mountains, and joining gangs. In 1943, out of 3,000 volunteers, the number of deserters was 1,870.
A group of Chechens led by Alauddin Khamchiev and Abdurakhman Beltoev sheltered the parachute landing of German intelligence officer Lange and ferried him across the front lines. The criminals were awarded knighthoods and transferred to the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic to organize an armed uprising.
According to the NKVD and NKGB of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR, 8,535 people were under operational control, including 27 German paratroopers, 457 people suspected of ties to German intelligence, 1,410 members of fascist organizations, 619 mullahs and active sectarians, and 2,126 deserters. Between September and October 1943, 243 people were liquidated and legalized. As of November 1, 35 gangs with a total of 245 members and 43 lone bandits were operating in the republic.
More than 4,000 people who took part in the armed uprisings of 1941–1942 have ceased active operations, but they are not surrendering their weapons—pistols, machine guns, automatic rifles—and are hiding them for a new armed uprising, which will be timed to coincide with the second German offensive in the Caucasus.”
As you can see, the Chechens and Ingush were far from harmless during the war. This report doesn't include information about how they shot and slaughtered Red Army soldiers or how many Soviet citizens died at the hands of Chechen bandits who sided with the enemy. These figures were reported separately. Mass desertion and evasion of the Red Army draft, armed uprisings, attacks on NKVD task forces and detachments, attacks on military units' rear areas, murders, robberies, and outright aiding German saboteurs—these are the things Chechnya and Ingushetia became notorious for during the war.
And here's what's surprising. German intelligence colonel Osman Gube, captured by the NKVD, testified during interrogation: "Among the Chechens and Ingush, I easily found the right people, willing to betray, go over to the Germans, and serve them. I was surprised: what were these people dissatisfied with? Under Soviet rule, the Chechens and Ingush lived quite prosperously, in abundance, much better than in pre-revolutionary times, as I personally confirmed after more than four months in Checheno-Ingushetia. The Chechens and Ingush, I repeat, lack nothing, which was striking to me, recalling the difficult conditions and constant deprivations that the mountain emigrants endured in Turkey and Germany. I could find no other explanation than that these Chechen and Ingush people, with their treasonous attitudes towards their homeland, were driven by selfish considerations, a desire to preserve at least the remnants of their well-being under the Germans, to render a service, in compensation for which the occupiers would leave them part of their livestock and food, land and housing.”
What's more, the Chechens even managed to give Adolf Hitler a white horse as a special token of gratitude. The Kalmyks were no better, openly collaborating with the German occupiers and providing them with massive assistance.
Could Stalin tolerate such betrayal and banditry in the Red Army's rear, when many Soviet people were dying at the front, while others, struggling in the deep rear, forged the weapons of victory with all their might?! Naturally, he couldn't. Such luxury was unaffordable. So it shouldn't be surprising that they were treated so harshly—deported.
In recent years, some authors have claimed that nearly 50% of Chechens and Ingush perished during the deportation, that it was outright genocide. However, there was no genocide of these peoples whatsoever. This is a complete lie. Here are some specific figures. According to reliable data, there were 436,000 Chechens and Ingush in 1937 (in the census, they were counted as a single Vainakh people). In 1944, there were 459,486 of them, and in 1959, 525,000, including 419,000 Chechens and 106,000 Ingush. That is 20.4% more than in 1937 and 14.2% more than in 1944. So where is even a 50% genocide here?! If, for example, we compare it with Belarus, where 22% of the population (2 million out of 9 million people) perished at the hands of Hitler's barbarians, then the pre-war population in this glorious republic was reached only a quarter of a century later, in 1970.
The alleged genocide of 50% of the deported population of Checheno-Ingushetia is even more false when you consider that the population of the USSR as a whole grew by only 13% from 1937 to 1959, not by 20.4%, as for the Chechens and Ingush. Moreover, their population growth is practically the same as that of the peoples of the North Caucasus who were not deported—Avars, Ossetians, Kabardins, Kumyks, and so on. The latter experienced an average population growth of 25% over the same period, while for the Chechens and Ingush, I repeat, it was 20.4%. Where is the genocide here?
So there was no genocide whatsoever. Just as there was no illegal or unjust deportation—everyone got what they deserved.
Myth #174: After the war, Stalin dealt harshly with the command of the Soviet Army Air Force and the leadership of the aviation industry.
We're talking about the repressions against Air Marshal A.A. Novikov and the People's Commissar (Minister) of the Aviation Industry A.I. Shakhurin, among others. Yes, indeed, they were arrested and imprisoned in 1946. To this day, almost everyone believes these respected individuals were treated cruelly and unfairly. Moreover, it's believed that the impetus for the "aviators' case" was supposedly a denunciation by Stalin's son, Vasily, who, as we know, was a pilot. It's not surprising that Khrushchev's lies flow from this myth—this Trotskyist lied even worse. He used every opportunity to hurl a hefty boulder of dirt at Stalin. But in reality, the opposite was true, and these aviators were deservedly imprisoned.
First of all, it should be noted that the true beginning of the post-war "aviators' case" dates back to at least mid-1943. From the memoirs of the outstanding Soviet aircraft designer A.S. Yakovlev, "The Goal of Life" (Moscow, 1988, pp. 284-286): "June 3, 1943. On June 3, 1943, Deputy People's Commissar P.V. Dementyev, who was in charge of serial production, and I were summoned to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief's Headquarters. In addition to Stalin, Marshals Vasilevsky and Voronov were in the office. We immediately noticed pieces of cracked fabric covering from an airplane wing on the table and realized what was going on. An unpleasant conversation was ahead.
The fact is that the wing coverings on Yak-9 fighters produced by one of the Eastern factories began to crack and peel off. There were several instances of the fabric peeling off the wings in flight. This was due to the poor quality of the nitrocellulose paint supplied by a Ural chemical plant, which used hastily tested substitutes. The paint was unstable, quickly exposed to atmospheric conditions, cracked, and the fabric covering of the wing peeled off the plywood. We were already aware of this defect and did everything we could to eliminate it.
Author's note : It should be noted that, early in the war, the State Defense Committee issued a decree strictly prohibiting changes to either already approved and accepted for production weapons and military equipment (including aircraft), or to their production technologies, without special permission from the State Defense Committee. Nevertheless, such instances did occur. Those who initiated them were held strictly accountable, as this was always fraught with serious negative consequences for the combat readiness of Soviet troops, not to mention the fact that such initiatives disrupted the high rate of weapons and military equipment production.
“Stalin, pointing to the pieces of worthless paneling lying on the table, asked:
" Do you know anything about this?" he asked, reading a report from the air force stationed in the Kursk area, sent along with samples of the defective skin.
We said we were aware of cases of hull failure. He interrupted us:
" What incidents? The entire fighter fleet is unfit for combat. There have been up to ten cases of skins being torn off in mid-air. Pilots are afraid to fly. Why did this happen?!"
Stalin took pieces of canvas, the paint coating of which was completely cracked and falling off in pieces, showed them to us and asked:
- What is this?
Dementyev said we were aware of the defect and were taking steps to stop production of the defective aircraft and repair those already produced. Dementyev promised to rectify the situation as soon as possible and ensure the combat readiness of all aircraft produced recently. Stalin turned to us indignantly:
— Do you know that this is disrupting an important operation that cannot be carried out without the participation of fighters?
Yes, we knew that serious battles were being prepared in the Orel-Kursk area, and our health at that moment was terrible.
" Why did this happen?" Stalin continued to grow increasingly angry. " Why were several hundred planes produced with defective skin?"
You know we need fighter jets like we need air right now! How could you allow this situation to happen, and why didn't you take action sooner?
We explained that this defect was impossible to detect at the factory when the aircraft was being manufactured. It only becomes apparent over time, when the aircraft are not under a hangar roof but rather on front-line airfields, exposed to rain, sunlight, and other atmospheric conditions. Detecting the defect at the factory itself is also difficult because the aircraft are sent straight from the factory to the front.
Never before had I seen Stalin so indignant.
- So, this wasn’t known at the plant?
- Yes, it was not known.
— So, this only became apparent at the front in front of the enemy?
- Yes, that's true.
" Do you know that only the most treacherous enemy could have acted like that?! That's exactly what they would have done—produced serviceable planes at the factory, only to have them prove useless at the front! The enemy wouldn't have inflicted more damage on us, wouldn't have come up with anything worse. This is working for Hitler!"
He repeated several times that the most insidious enemy could not have done more harm.
" Do you know that you disabled fighter aircraft? Do you know what a service you rendered to Hitler?!"
You are Nazis!
It's hard to imagine our state at that moment. I felt myself growing cold. And Dementyev stood there, flushed red, nervously fingering the piece of ill-fated paneling.
Several minutes passed in stony silence. Finally, Stalin, after walking around for a while in thought, calmed down and asked in a businesslike tone:
- What are we going to do?
Dementyev stated that we will immediately fix all the planes.
— What do you mean, immediately? How long?
Dementyev thought for a moment and exchanged glances with me:
- Within two weeks.
- You're not lying?
- No, Comrade Stalin, we will do it.
I couldn't believe my ears. I thought this job would take at least two months.
Stalin never expected the machines to be fixed so quickly. Frankly, I was surprised too, and thought: Dementyev's promise would temporarily ward off the storm, but what would happen next?
The deadline was accepted. However, Stalin ordered the military prosecutor's office to immediately investigate the circumstances of the case, to determine how the low-quality nitrocellulose varnishes and adhesives had found their way to the aircraft factory, and why the quality of the varnishes had not been properly tested in the laboratory. He immediately ordered two investigative commissions to be dispatched: to the Ural Paint and Varnish Plant and to the serial plant that produced the Yaks.
As you can see, the "aviators' case" had already begun back then. Hundreds of fighters with defective skins—that's so serious that the investigation into the circumstances of the defective fighter jets' production has been in full swing ever since. There were further instances later when Stalin expressed his indignation over the widespread defects in fighter jet production.
However, the most important incident, which effectively became the impetus for the future work of Marshal Novikov and People's Commissar Shakhurin, occurred during the Potsdam Conference. During breaks between conference sessions, Stalin met with the command of the Soviet occupation forces in Germany and, as always, devoted special attention to meeting with his favorite pilots. During this meeting, three Air Force officers, the pilots, came specifically to Stalin and angrily complained to the Supreme Commander about the poor aircraft technology and the frequent accidents and disasters. It was then that the clouds over Novikov and Shakhurin truly thickened.
At the climax of the investigation, it was established that over 4,000 "flying coffins" had been sent to combat aviation regiments during the war! Incidentally, a single fighter plane of that era cost at least 100,000 rubles. In other words, under the "brave leadership" of Novikov and Shakhurin, the aviation industry produced "flying coffins" worth 400 million rubles! Personally, I'm surprised at just how Novikov and Shakhurin are still alive, having merely received prison sentences. After all, under the law of the time, damage to the state in excess of 50 rubles was considered significant and punishable by death. Stalin, meanwhile, would literally fly into a rage whenever he heard of damage to the Soviet state, especially on such a scale, and in his rage he would demand the most drastic measures. Worse yet. It also turned out that the Air Force command and the leadership of the People's Commissariat of the Aviation Industry ignored the demands of military representatives at the factories, who insisted on the inadmissibility of accepting defective aircraft.
So, at Plant No. 31, the military representative rejected over 100 aircraft, but the Air Force generals walked around, looked at them, and, having ordered that acceptance be continued, departed for Moscow... to submit reports on themselves for an award for the production and acceptance of the “flying coffins.”
The situation was most dire at Factory No. 61—they had produced a pilot batch of Yak-9U fighters with VK-107A engines, and the entire batch was rejected. The aircraft were completely unfit for combat. It turned out that the Yak-9U had only passed factory testing as a prototype, meaning no one had the right to put it into serial production.
Of the 4,000 "flying coffins" mentioned above, 2,267 aircraft were immediately grounded due to design and manufacturing defects. However, it should be noted that, according to former Military Council member N.S. Shimanov, the number of defective aircraft written off for the war was not 4,000, but 5,000! In other words, the damage to the state amounted to at least 500 million rubles! Half a billion rubles!
Shortly after the Potsdam Conference, on August 24, 1945, the State Defense Committee adopted one of its final decrees, "On the Yak-9 Aircraft with the VK-107A Engine." The final section of the decree stated: "For inattention to reports from Air Force combat units regarding serious defects in the Yak-9 with the VK-107A engine and for his lack of persistence in demanding that these defects be corrected, the Commander of the Red Army Air Forces, Comrade Novikov, is to be reprimanded."
But the matter did not stop there. In mid-March 1946, a state commission was created to review the activities of the Air Force. It included Deputy Minister of the USSR Armed Forces Marshal N.A. Bulganin, Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) G.M. Malenkov, Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces and Deputy Commander of the USSR Armed Forces Marshal G.K. Zhukov, Chief of the General Staff and First Deputy Minister of the USSR Armed Forces Marshal A.M. Vasilevsky, Deputy Chief of the General Staff General of the Army S.M. Shtemenko, Chief of the Main Political Directorate of the USSR Armed Forces Colonel General I.V. Shikin, and three air marshals—S.I. Rudenko, K.A. Vershinin, and V.A. Sudets.
Naturally, state security agencies also joined the state commission's work. The infamous SMERSH agency presented a report. It stated that from 1942 to February 1946, 45,000 aircraft were cancelled on combat missions, 756 accidents, and 305 fatal crashes occurred in Air Force units and training institutions due to poor-quality materiel. The report also listed instances of aircraft simply disintegrating in mid-air!
Following the work of the aforementioned state commission, a Council of People's Commissars decree of March 16, 1946, dismissed Novikov from his post as Air Force Commander for incompetence, and he was soon arrested. Also arrested at the same time were A.I. Shakhurin, People's Commissar of the Aviation Industry; A.K. Repin, Chief Engineer of the Air Force; N.S. Shimanov, member of the Air Force Military Council; N.P. Seleznev, Chief of the Main Directorate of Air Force Orders; and A.V. Budnikov and G.M. Grigoryan, heads of departments of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR included the following definitions: anti-state practices; smuggling aircraft and engines with significant defects and serious design and manufacturing flaws into service during and after the war; concealing all of this from the government.
Novikov subsequently tried to explain everything away by slandering Vasily Iosifovich Stalin. He kept shouting after Stalin's death: "It's all Vaska's fault!" Vasily Iosifovich responded from prison, where he'd ended up by Khrushchev's "grace," that Novikov was to blame himself, for he was well aware of what was happening in the aviation industry and how Air Force generals brazenly accepted planes with massive defects, resulting in the mass deaths of pilots, Stalin's glorious falcons. The Air Force generals and their commander, Marshal Novikov, were convinced that "the mothers will give birth to new ones." For some reason, even their heads, seemingly filled with quite a decent amount of knowledge, repulsed the simplest thought, as if it were armor—mere mothers aren't the Virgin Mary and can't conceive by the Holy Spirit...
Later, former member of the Air Force Military Council N.S. Shimanov, admitting his guilt after serving his sentence, said the following: "Shakhurin created the appearance that the aviation industry was fulfilling the production program, and received awards for it. Instead of reporting to the People's Commissar of Defense (that is, Stalin – A.M. ) that planes were falling apart in the air, we sat in meetings and wrote schedules for eliminating defects in the aircraft. Novikov and Repin persecuted those who reported that defective aircraft were entering the army."
Shakhurin, after serving his sentence, also admitted his guilt through gritted teeth, saying the following: "You can't blame everything on Stalin! A minister has to answer for something... Let's say I did something wrong in aviation, then I definitely bear some responsibility for it. Otherwise, it's all Stalin."
So, was it fair, and did the aviators get what they deserved? I believe there won't be any difficulty in finding the true answer.
Myth #175: After the war, Stalin planned to deal harshly with the USSR's marshals and generals.
I don't know about cruelty—there's absolutely no data on that—but Stalin did plan to deal with the high-ranking generals and the marshals. First and foremost, for the tragedy of June 22, 1941. Because from that bitter day on, he never forgot that terrible tragedy. Few people know that, even at the very beginning of the war, Stalin secretly initiated a thorough analytical investigation into the causes and identification of the true perpetrators of that tragedy. The investigation was conducted both through state security agencies—military counterintelligence and later SMERSH, military intelligence (special analytical groups were created within the GRU and the General Staff)—and through Stalin's own intelligence and counterintelligence services. All data on the state of the troops, the actions of the border district command and the units within them, were subjected to a thorough analysis. All counterintelligence materials were reviewed, etc. Analytical assessments of the initial combat operations, particularly the first week, were regularly conducted. Toward the end of the war, when the Soviet state security agencies also acquired Nazi intelligence materials, comparative assessments of the Soviet troops' combat operations at the outset of the war were systematically conducted based on this in-depth analysis.
After the war, Stalin said that "victors can and should be judged, can and should be criticized and tested... there will be less arrogance, more modesty." For some reason, these words of Stalin's are usually linked to the case of Marshal Zhukov, who was "flogged" around the same year for immodest behavior and taking credit for nearly all the Soviet Army's combat achievements. However, this is not the case, although these words were partly applicable to Zhukov as well. These same words are also often linked to Stalin's attempts to curb the appetites of the Soviet generals and marshals, who, with incredible enthusiasm, engaged in outright plunder and pillage of defeated Germany.
Stalin, known for his exceptional personal modesty, was simply astonished and deeply hurt by the scale of the epidemic of greed, theft, and looting that engulfed the senior officer corps of the Soviet Army. After all, they had already been granted considerable rights to receive, under the laws of war, captured property. However, they were all struck by such a powerful epidemic of greed that its full extent remains unclear. Some generals even lost their heads so completely that, in their insolence, they appealed to Stalin to allow them unhindered passage into the country of the goods they had plundered in Germany, which had been detained at customs. One such colonel general received a unique written response from Stalin. In response to his petition, Joseph Vissarionovich wrote a resolution declaring that it was necessary to allow the passage of such-and-such a colonel's junk. In the blink of an eye, from colonel general to colonel! In other words, the insolent generals and marshals, frankly driven mad by greed, didn't even realize that such behavior could easily lead to their ranks being stripped! To the obvious surprise of many, I must point out that of the senior command staff, only two marshals—the Grand Marshal of the Great Victory, Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky, and Chief Marshal of Aviation, the founder of Soviet long-range aviation, Alexander Yevgenyevich Golovanov—were not involved in the orgy of plundering Germany's spoils!
Incidentally, they were also the only marshals who did not betray their Supreme Commander-in-Chief! For his categorical refusal to betray, Marshal of the Great Victory K.K. Rokossovsky, whose very name made all the fascist scum tremble, was instantly kicked out of the Ministry of Defense and shoved into retirement. Golovanov, meanwhile, was reduced to the rank of a simple pilot and mockingly placed under the command of a near-colonel.
All of this really happened. So there's no point in recounting these stories of theft, embezzlement, and looting. They're well-described in historical literature. There are even lists of the stolen goods, including property looted in Germany and discovered at Zhukov's dacha. We're interested in the main thing—the investigation into the causes of the tragedy of June 22.
By the end of 1952, Stalin already had the summaries of this eloquent investigation in hand. During the final stage of this investigation, at Stalin's direct instigation, the General Staff of our army initiated a detailed interrogation of the surviving generals about the actual date they received the first order to bring the troops under their command to combat readiness to repel the Wehrmacht. All those interviewed clearly stated June 18–19, and only the generals from the ZAPOVO wrote in black and white that they had received no orders to this effect, and some of them even learned of the war from Molotov's speech at 12:00 PM on June 22 (see, for example, VIZh. 1989. No. 5).
Based on the materials of this investigation, Stalin intended to seriously settle accounts with the main culprits of the 1941 tragedy among the high-ranking generals and marshals, including as an integral component of the military-party complex that had developed during the war. At the same time, Stalin planned to sever the party bureaucracy from the governance of the state. Stalin planned to strike on two fronts at once: the party bureaucracy and the high-ranking generals and marshals, who had become so intertwined and cemented to the USSR's misfortune during the war that, as a military-party complex, they posed a colossal threat to the very existence of the USSR—Stalin's life's work.
It's no coincidence, then, that a number of generals and marshals, led by Zhukov, immediately defected to Khrushchev's side. Then, under his overall leadership, they staged a coup d'état on June 26, 1953, during which L.P. Beria was assassinated without trial or investigation. Meanwhile, all the materials from Stalin's investigation into the tragedy of June 22, 1941, were in the hands of Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria. He was simultaneously conducting a full investigation into Stalin's assassination. The main culprits—former State Security Minister Ignatiev and his Central Committee handler, Khrushchev—were identified. On June 25, 1953, Beria wrote a request for authorization to arrest former State Security Minister Ignatiev (and Khrushchev, as his Central Committee handler, was supposed to be next!), and by midday on June 26, he was shot.
So Stalin had no plans for cruelty toward the senior officer corps. The idea was to severely punish those responsible for the tragedy of June 22, 1941. Few people know that even during his lifetime, Stalin openly admitted, albeit privately, that the war had wiped out approximately 30 million people in the country. It was for such losses of the most priceless asset—people, mostly those nurtured by the Soviet regime and those who died heroically in its defense—not to mention material losses—that Stalin wanted to hold some of the senior officers to the strictest accountability.
It's no surprise that just three years later, in 1956, at the 20th Congress of the CPSU, Khrushchev, having misunderstood a justly harsh punishment, provoked a frenzy of unbridled, vile slander against Stalin, primarily due to the tragedy that befell the USSR in 1941. Nor is it surprising that the first military figure to get involved was G.K. Zhukov, who dared to accuse Joseph Vissarionovich of allegedly preventing the troops from being brought to combat readiness!
However, Stalin wasn't wrong to call them all worthless kittens who refused to learn. And so it happened: right at the 20th Congress, Khrushchev, Zhukov, and Co. acquitted Tukhachevsky and Co.! And since they are rehabilitated "innocent victims of Stalinism," it follows that their heirs—that is, Zhukov, Timoshenko, and Khrushchev—all of whom, by the way, were inextricably linked to both Tukhachevsky and his accomplices, primarily I. Yakir and I. Uborevich—did everything correctly and are innocent. Especially for the tragedy of June 22, 1941! For that very tragedy, which they orchestrated almost in strict accordance with the "Plan for the Defeat of the USSR in the War with Germany" developed by Tukhachevsky and Co.!
However, it's long been known that no matter how long a rope twists, it always ends. And even through the dense jungle of Khrushchev-Zhukov lies, the light of Truth finally broke through! And its essence is that, seriously fearing the deservedly harsh punishment for inflicting unprecedented demographic and material damage on the Soviet Union, the most influential part of the USSR's senior officer corps, led by Zhukov, entered into a secret conspiracy with Khrushchev and Co., ultimately carrying out a coup d'état. And the coup began with the vile assassination of Stalin!
So the question is: who, then, was cruel and treacherous? I hope that after reading all five books in this project, it won't be difficult to draw the right conclusion.
Myth #176: Stalin illegally and brutally dealt with innocent leaders of the Leningrad party organization (the "Leningrad Affair")
To begin, I suggest you familiarize yourself with the contents of a yet-to-be-published analytical article, kindly provided by a fellow writer, the renowned St. Petersburg researcher Elena Prudnikova, at least to free your consciousness, at least a little, from the oppressive pressure of deeply ingrained stereotypes. Believe me, the article is worth it.
