When did World War II begin
Silhouettes 15 tanks, 15 state-of-the-art cars barely loomed at dawn. Behind there was a night march, and ahead ... ahead - the line of defense of the Nazis. What awaits the Soviet tank company there? For her, 26 kilometers of march was a trifle, but as an infantry, were people exhausted? Will they keep up with tanks? Is intelligence accurate? Did the Nazis manage to equip firing points at the captured line? In a few hours, everything will become clear.
It is time. Motors roared. Captain Arman’s tanks rushed forward.
Paul Matissovich Armand was not French. He comes from Latvia, but as a teenager he lived for several years in France, and received his first identity card there, hence the unusual name. Before the war, he was commander of a tank battalion near Bobruisk.
The Nazis did not have anti-tank weapons, only machine gun bursts rained down on armor with peas. “The machine gun is the worst enemy of the infantry,” is written in the manual, and the tankers combed the observed firing points with fire and caterpillars. The infantry still lagged behind. You can’t hold on, they’ll pinpoint and cover aviation or artillery. Retreat? Captain Arman was quick to make decisions. The flags on the commander's tank began to flash: "Do as I do," and the tanks rushed forward. Here are the outskirts of the town. No one is expecting a raid by Soviet tanks, and according to intelligence, there are no fascists in the town. The tanks rush with open hatches, Arman in the lead vehicle.
Suddenly an Italian officer runs out from around the corner, waving his arms, shouting something. “I took it for my own people,” understood Armand. Tank hatches slammed shut. The fascist motorized infantry battalion was not lucky. Wheels are rolling along the pavement, wreckage trucks are flying, surviving soldiers are hiding behind stone fences. But the fascists fled quickly recovered themselves, bottles of gasoline were flying, surviving guns were being dragged onto the roofs of houses. The commander knows well that it is impossible to fight in the city of one armored vehicle, they will immediately burn it. New solution - go ahead. Tanks rush through the town, on the outskirts sweep two artillery batteries.
And here are the Italian tanks. A short duel - and three "Italians" are burning, the other five retreated. Our tanks didn’t damage their shooting.
Further action in the enemy's rear is risky, and the ammunition is running out. The company again penetrates the front line, now in the opposite direction.
Infantry for the day did not break through the defense of the Nazis. After the tanks left, the surviving machine guns revived, enemy aircraft flew in ... The battle failed. And although Arman has something to be proud of ... what to report to the commander?
But the brigade commander Krivoshein is not upset. Not so bad. The tanks are intact, the losses are small, and most importantly - the fascist offensive stopped. And Colonel Voronov reported that success was in the secondary direction. Two junction railway stations are occupied.
Bright stars burn in the anthracite black sky. He died a seriously wounded tower shooter - crawled out to cut the telephone wires. The iron clang, the shadows of portable lamps rush around - these technicians are busy with tanks.
The end of October is the 29 day of the year 1936.
Yes Yes. This is not a typo. The time of action is October 1936, the place is the town of Sesena, south-west of Madrid. Today this name tells us nothing, but then it was very important.
How many times did World War II begin?
In a strange time, we live. People who realize the most cherished dreams of Hitler, award each other a medal "for the fight against fascism." I would clarify - “for the struggle together with fascism”. But this is by the way.
In the European tradition, it is considered to be the beginning of the Second World War, the German attack on Poland 1 September 1939. The Chinese (remember, this is not just a nation, one of many, this is a quarter of humanity) consider the beginning of the war the so-called “incident on the Lugouqiao bridge” on July 7 on July 1937 - the start of Japan’s open aggression against China. Why not? Japan signed a capitulation in the Second World War, including no separate surrender to China, which means there was no separate war.
Americans almost officially consider Pearl Harbor (December 7 1941 of the year) the beginning of world war - and really, only from this moment, in their understanding, the European and Asian wars merged into the worldwide. This position also has its reason.
But in order to determine the exact date of the outbreak of war, one must understand who led it and because of what.
Who fought?
What was the meaning of that war? Why did people in one coalition often turn out to be very different from each other, why did one country act either as a predator, as a victim, then as a fighter for justice in such an uncompromising clash? In uncompromising - in the direct sense of the word. Not many wars end with the complete destruction of the military-economic potential and the military-political elite of one of the parties.
I do not want to give lengthy explanations, here they have no place and no time. But it is obvious to me - after all, it was a struggle between two ideologies. And the ideologies are extremely simple. The first is that people are created equal. The second is that people are not created equal. From the second ideology there is a non-controversial consequence - that since people are not equal, they can be higher or lower simply by birthright, and higher ones can solve their problems at the expense of lower ones.
Who were the main carriers of the first and second ideologies, let the respected reader guess.
The complexity of the situation is that people often do not realize what kind of ideology they profess. So, the founding fathers of the United States, having written down beautiful words about equality of people in the Constitution, were slave owners themselves. After all, the negros, in their understanding, were not exactly people! Therefore, some countries are not immediately determined what they camp.
What is called the “anti-Hitler coalition” was an extremely heterogeneous company. Many took part in it, frankly, not immediately and under the influence of the “fried rooster” or the strong powers, or even “received in the face” for supporting Hitler, such as, for example, Romania. Some, being ideologically close to Hitler and even taking part in some of his actions (like pre-war Poland), then for some reason turned out to be in the rank of "lower". And only one state - the USSR - fought against the fascist bloc almost from the moment of its formation until complete defeat, almost nine years.
The “fascist” bloc was very definite. First of all, because he had a very definite ideological basis. And any nationalist group in any country was its natural ally, if only it considered its nation “superior” and if this nation did not turn out to be “superfluous” in the geopolitical deck of the Anti-Communist Covenant. The name "fascist" is not a very accurate ideological label. The German prisoners, for example, were genuinely surprised when they were called fascists. The self-name of this organization, the war with which flooded whole continents with fire and blood, reflects its essence. And the essence of the struggle was not even against the Comintern, but against the community of people who did not pay attention to their national identity.
Nationalism is not always bad. If a country is in one form or another oppressed by other countries or foreign organizations, the liberation movement is often called and is nationalistic. Sage Sun Yat-sen considered nationalism the only medicine capable of awakening China from the narcotic sleep into which the Western powers plunged him, mainly England, and in many respects was right.
And internationalism is different. The ruling circles of the West were not then nationally blinkered - the capital of nationality does not have. But their internationalism is called cosmopolitanism; I will not explain the difference.
Therefore, the content of that stage of the world storieswhich is called the Second World War, is the confrontation not of two imperialist groups, as in the first world war, but of the Soviet Union on the one hand and the bloc of Germany, Italy and Japan on the other, as the most complete spokespersons of the two ideologies. Later, the nationalists of oppressed and exterminated nations and controversial cosmopolitans joined the Soviet Union, at different stages of its struggle.
Therefore, the beginning of the Second World War is more correct to consider the first collision of the regular parts of the main belligerents, or a corresponding statement of at least one of them. So when did the direct military clash between the Union and the powers of the Anti-Comintern Pact (first called the “Berlin-Rome axis”), that is, the actual start of the war, happen?
Why we did not celebrate the anniversary
The author is not a professional historian. The article was conceived long enough for the 70 anniversary of this event, but the anniversary was unnoticed by anyone. The necessary literature came into the hands too late, and reading it was not easy.
Here is an example: the description of the battle given at the beginning of this article. In the newspapers of that time and in later memoirs, this fight was reported, but the Soviet tank company was called Spanish or Republican. Although the name of the commander could be typed - is it not a foreigner?
The level of conspiracy was such that, in the memoirs of the famous 4 air battles of November 1936 of the year, published many years after these events, Soviet pilots
the fighters recall that they helped the “republican” bombers who were in a difficult situation, and the navigator of one of these bombers, Kuzma Demenchuk, warmly spoke of the “governmental” fighters who had come to the rescue of his link.
So why did the Italian divisions and the German air squadrons fought openly, while the Soviet battalions and squadrons pretended to be Spaniards, or, God forbid, mercenaries? The reason is in the prostitution position of Western countries. Following the well-known tactics of street punks, they "separated" the belligerents, grasping only one of them. The legitimate, democratically elected government of Spain was officially put on a par with the coup, deprived of the right to purchase weaponsand to the aid of friends. The “non-intervention committee” headed by Lord Plymouth kept watch over this (do not confuse with Lord Owen’s “Commission on Bosnia”).
Fighting for the survival of the world community, we violated the “laws” imposed by this community.
True, thanks to the inherent hypocrisy of the West, it was possible, simply “observing propriety,” to look somewhat better in his eyes. Therefore, Voronov became a Frenchman Voltaire, Levers - Palancar, Osadchy - Simon, and Tarhov - captain Antonio.
The most difficult time of the defense of Madrid was the beginning of November 1936. The government of the republic and the military command, according to the urgent demands of Gorev and Meretskov, were evacuated from the capital. The head of the operational department of the front headquarters with his officers went over to the enemy. The 21 one thousand Madrid Communists (from 25) held the front. Captain Arman gloomily reported to the defense council: "Republican tanks heroically broke into their native Madrid"
At that time Comrade Xanthi was quite famous in Madrid. Without occupying an official post, he organizes work teams, conducts preparations for underground war. He is in the hottest areas, Durruti himself asks him to be more careful. But who is Xanthi is a separate topic, and I mention it in connection with his remark about secrecy: “... the fascists know that we blew up. From whom, then, is the secret? For some reason, the Spaniards and ours consider it necessary to be silent about such things. Well, the fascists, of course, are silent, - why should they confess? ”.
Unfortunately, this has been the case since that time. At first everything was secret, but now there are almost no eyewitnesses, almost no memoirs.
Why we went to war
Do not think that the Soviet Union was going to win the civil war instead of the Spaniards. If it were just a civil war, the Soviet Union could have limited itself to sending advisers, as was the case in China at the end of the 20s. Then there pro-Japanese, pro-British and pro-American generals fought among themselves, and the nationalist South Chinese government tried in vain, either by force or by diplomacy, to unite the country.
The Republic of Spain had many fighters, courageous, but untrained and disorganized. And the Air Force, for example, by October totaled 1 bomber and 2 fighters. Even before the war, Western countries refused to sell (even sell!) Weapons to the Spanish Republic. Nevertheless, the Republic could well cope with the rebellion, and the coup was suppressed in most of the territory, although almost the entire army took part in it. It all started for the fascists quite unsuccessfully, the head of the rebellion General Sanhurkho died in a plane crash, the forces of the fascists were geographically fragmented, they had no access to the Mediterranean Sea. Their main forces were in Morocco, and the Strait of Gibraltar was blocked fleet Republic. The rebellion was on the verge of collapse.
And here the powers of the Anti-Comintern Pact intervened. The speed of the reaction of world fascism is simply amazing. In the very first days, Italian-German transport aircraft was at the disposal of Franco, and the rebel army was in Spain.
The most difficult thing is that throughout the entire Spanish war, the operational and strategic superiority of the fascists was obvious. Carefully coordinated strikes on the most painful, most vulnerable points of the Republic began very quickly. The offensive in Extremadura (from the north, from the south and from Portugal) brought together the divided territories of the fascists. The occupation of San Sebastian and Irun cut off the Northern front from the French border, and the capture of Teruel almost cut the Republic in half. Well, the very attack on Madrid ... For the entire time of the war, the republican command did not conduct such operations, and the fascists conducted them in the first three months, acting very heterogeneous forces. For commanders, successful leadership of the coalition forces is aerobatics, and Franco was hardly such a commander. Here are viewed the brains of the German General Staff.
In the fascist army, in the initial period of the war, the Spaniards proper, even with the Moroccans and the criminals from the Foreign Legion, were few — 90 thousands. And the fascists from other countries fought: Germans - 50 thousand (commander-in-chief Colonel Varlimont), Italians - 150 thousand, 20 thousand Portuguese, etc. After brassing after Munich, they even sometimes did not change their form. And these were already put together, personnel units. The Italians had the combat experience of Abyssinia, for them and the Germans the First World War ended not too long ago. The Germans and Italians did not suffer from complexes about "neutrality" and "non-intervention", and hundreds of thousands of their soldiers and officers were recruited in Spain for combat experience.
Republican detachments and columns of the People's Militia could not restrain the blow of the armies of the fascist bloc. The Spaniards did not then have a unified command and supply, and decisions about the attack were sometimes taken in units by voting.
But the point was not that some regular legal government was overthrown by foreign putsch generals with foreign aid. Have there been such episodes in history? For anyone sneeze not zdravstvueshs.
The fact was that by some miracle the Soviet government found out that the whole world will have to fight fascism sooner or later, whether the West wants it or not. And in this case, the sooner, naturally, the better. And as the Soviet government learned this in 1936, it still remains a mystery. Nobody knew, but it knew. This quality, by the way, is called "perspicacity".
Maybe you think I'm exaggerating? And it's easy to check. It is enough to read the newspapers of the autumn of 1936, with reports from rallies and meetings of workers - and you will immediately stumble upon speeches that said openly: “Today bombs fall on Madrid, and tomorrow they will fall on Paris and London!”.
That is why, while at the training centers in Archen and Albacete, Soviet instructors taught the Spaniards and inter-brigade men the use of Soviet equipment, Soviet gunners and pilots had to catch the Italian Ansaldo, Caproni and Fiats, German T-1, with crosshairs, " Heinkels and Junkers. But, as they say, "this was not reported."
The first battle, the first company, the first tankman
Even knowledgeable people sometimes believe that there were only advisers. Well, yes, there were advisers. Of the 59 Heroes of the Soviet Union for the Spanish campaign (starting with the Decree of 31 on December 1936 of the year), there were two advisers: Batov, an adviser-team leader, and Smushkevich, an adviser-pilot. The rest are pilots, tankers, gunners, submariners. 19 from 59 - posthumously. And the signalmen, anti-aircraft gunners, reconnaissance agents, saboteurs, in general, all the specialists, who should be in the army in force, also fought. There were also engineers, organizers of weapons production, shipbuilders, of course, doctors, and many, many others. Yes, and advisers ... here is a quote from the memoirs of the adviser: “Upon seeing that the calculation of the nearest gun had lost its commander and gunner, I rushed to the artillerymen and helped open fire ... several tanks caught fire ... the attack of the enemy was choked ... commanders of the Red Army contributed to the implementation of a variety of military duties. "
Among these “diverse military duties” the actions of our tank crews and pilots are best known. In the defensive battles of the autumn 1936 - winter 1937, the Soviet tank brigades and battalions played an important role. The defense of Madrid, the battleship of MP Petrov’s tank battalion near Las Rosas and Majadahonda, the assault on the strategically important height Pingarron are often mentioned. The behavior of Soviet soldiers and officers, then called "advisers" or "internationalist volunteers", served as an example to anti-fascists. Not uncommon were the cases when the crews of the downed tanks went into battle with machine guns removed from the tanks. And in the course of the battle on Haram, as noted by the participant in these battles R.Ya. Malinovsky (later the Minister of Defense, Marshal of the Soviet Union), "Republican tanks ... achieved complete domination on the battlefield." And in the Guadalajara counter-battle of 18 in March 1937, the Soviet tank brigade decided its outcome.
Time has been won. Around April 1937, Spanish crews trained by Soviet instructors began to enter the republican army.
However, leave. Who is interested in it now? But let's remember the date - October 29 1936 of the year, and the name is Paul Matissovich Armand. Nikolai Nikolayevich Voronov also took part in this battle, but I don’t know if his gunners were Soviet military personnel.
I did not find information about the earlier actions of tankers and gunners.
Commander of the first squadron
Leafing through crumbling pages further. Here is a news story about 28 operation in October 1936 of the year: “... government planes ... did the most successful bombardment of the entire war. A squadron of government aircraft ... appeared over an airfield in Talavera ... and dropped bombs that used to break 15 rebel planes. "
Who were the crews? Here is the commander of one of them:
"The black-haired, stocky man cheerfully called his name:
- Khalil Ekrem! - And immediately burst out laughing. To clarify, he added in Russian:
“Turk!”
Khalil Ekrem, he is the commander of the flight school in Tambov Volkan Semenovich Goranov became the Hero of the Soviet Union in 1936. And his real name was Zakhar Zakhariev. Much later, he is Colonel General, Deputy Minister of Defense of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria. However, the crew was international, the Russians were in the minority: only two, and the rest - this very “Turk”, three Spaniards and the author of the memoirs, the Ukrainian Kuzma Terentevich Demenchuk. One of the Russians, Ivanov, is a former White Guard, the last name, apparently, not real. He fought bravely shoulder to shoulder with the Soviet and much later died in France, in poppies.
So does 28 October 1936 of the year? No, perhaps. Still, the crews, it seems, are mixed, the planes are “potez”. Squadron commander - Spaniard Martin Luna. Looking further.
The first battle of the Soviet fighter squadrons is quite well-known, it was observed on the morning of November 4 over Carabanchel by Madrid, and journalists from many countries. The pilots of our I-15, for the first time in their lives, entered into a real, not a training, fight, showed “Junkers” and “Fiats”, “that a new dog appeared in the quarter,” as the Americans say. The 30 fighters Pumpura and Rychagov didn’t just knock down 7 airplanes in one day, they deprived the Nazis of air superiority.
But finally, the find. Thanks to KT Demenchuk!
“October 28 made its first sortie our high-speed bombers SB. Three squadrons of 9 — 10 airplanes in each were formed; they formed a bomber group. It was headed by A.Ye. Zlatotsvetov, the chief of staff was P.A. Kotov. In addition to the bomber, a fighter group was created (3 squadrons I-15 and 3 — I-16) and, later, assault (30 SSS aircraft) ... The commander of the 1 bomber squadron - E.G. Schacht, Swiss, revolutionary, from the 22 year in the USSR, a graduate of the Borisoglebsk military aviation school. He headed the first sortie 28 October.
So, Ernest Genrikhovich Schacht, October 28 1936. However, Komesk-2, V.S. Holzunov, having arrived in Spain before the arrival of the Soviet technology, flew to the bombing of the fascists on the old slow-moving bregek-19. Being a high-class professional, he walked in mountainous terrain at extremely low altitude, struck and disappeared so secretly that the enemy did not have time to open fire. And our other pilots, starting from September 1936, flew on everything that can fly, right up to the shelves of the First World War.
With the advent of the Security Council (they were called "Natasha" and "Katyusha"), the situation in the sky of Spain has changed. The aircraft sat even with a full load easily left from any fighter. On combat missions, they often went unaccompanied. When such a method was used in the 1940 by the English mosquito bombers, it was called a revolutionary innovation in aviation tactics.
In the fall of 1936, only on the Madrid front from 160 Soviet 27 pilots fell in battle.
That is, in fact, all that I was able to learn about the first battle of our troops against the Nazis. October 28 1936 of the year - the first combat departure of aviation (Squadron SB, commander - major (?) E.G Shacht), and 29-th - first encounter with the Nazis on the ground (tank company T-26, commander - captain PM .Arman).
Maybe the decision to commission the Soviet troops was secret? It turns out that did not happen. 23 October 1936, the Soviet government announced an official statement in which it was said in black and white that in the conditions of the German-Italian aggression in Spain, the Soviet Union would not be neutral. What does it mean during the war not to stick to neutrality? It means to enter the war.
So, October 23, 28-th and 29-th. Of course, these days are incomparable with June 22 and May 9, which overshadowed all the dates of Russian history, but we also need to remember them!
And then there was a war. In Spain, all types and types of troops fought, only the infantry was represented mainly by officers-advisers. The least known, but the most important was the role of our officers in the planning and conduct of most operations.
Second front
And since the fall of 1937, our troops entered the war with Japan, the third power of the “Pact”, in China. There were mainly aviation and general commanders as advisers, as well as staff operators, but not only them.
The difficulty was that there was no normal transport link with China, neither sea nor rail, because North China called Manzhou-Guo then belonged to Japan. By the way, the whole of Korea, the Chinese province of Taiwan, and now the Russian Kuriles and South Sakhalin - the empire was rather big.
A highway of more than 3 thousand kilometers was built from Turksib through Xinjiang, it served more than 5 thousand ZIS-5 trucks, and on the Soviet territory more than 5,5 thousand railway cars. For urgent cargo operated airline serviced by aircraft TB-3.
According to incomplete data, up to hundreds of tanks (how, incomprehensibly, not by their own moves), 1250 of the newest aircraft, more than 1400 artillery systems, tens of thousands of machine guns and small arms, etc. were transported to China.
However, there was a sea route through the ports of South China, Hong Kong, Rangoon and Haiphong (then French). But I simply did not find any mention of him in the memoir literature.
All this immediately went into battle. For example, the squadron V. Kurdyumova. Having made the most dangerous flight through the high-mountain deserts (V.Kurdyumov himself died at the same time), the 7 16 seven, on the day of arrival in Nanjing (November 21 1937 of the year) shot down a fighter and two bomber aircraft over the airfield. A squadron of SB bombers Kidalinsky and Machin the next day bombed the Shanghai airfield and Japanese ships in the roadstead. They opened an account of the destroyed Japanese warships, drowning, including, the first Japanese cruiser during World War II.
The nearly four-year war in China was full of events, but the actions of the pilots are best known. By the way, in the history of our aviation there are not too many operations similar to the FPPolynin bomber group raid on Taiwan 23 February 1938 of the year or the sinking of the bombing group TT T.Hryukin in winter 1938 — 1939 of the Japanese aircraft carrier (10 thousand tons).
Dear readers! How many of you have ever heard that our pilots ever sunk a cruiser or aircraft carrier? I want to note right away that the sinking of an aircraft carrier is not confirmed by other parties now, but it seems that there is a rational grain in this story - that is, our pilots really hunted for the Japanese aircraft carrier in June 1938.
In China, there were also military specialists from other types of troops — tankers, gunners, and engineers. I do not have numbers, I rely on evidence like:
“The situation quickly became tense. From there, wounded Soviet volunteers, mostly pilots, have already begun to arrive in Lanzhou. ”
This phrase is from the memoirs of the pilot D.A. Kudymov about the battle in the Three-hedged 29 on April 1938, on the birthday of the Japanese emperor.
Now the history of this war is practically inaccessible to the reader.
Third front
With the USSR relations with Finland have been bad since the revolution. The Finns destroyed their revolutionaries and at the same time several thousand of ours, and not only revolutionaries. For a number of reasons, Lenin then only sadly sighed and congratulated Swinhouvuda (the Finnish president, the name means “pig's head”) with independence. However, several attempts of the Finns to round off their territory at the expense of ours (for example, the “Olonets adventure”) were gently but resolutely stopped. On both sides, then, the units of special purpose were mainly active. For example, the raid of Toivo Antikainen’s armed detachment in the Finnish rear areas in the 1922 winter impressed the Finnish military so much that by the 1939 they had several tens of thousands of Suomi (very similar to PCA). And by that time we somehow forgot about the automata.
There are all sorts of neighbors, but with the advent of fascism, the Finns, in accordance with the idea of Svinhuvuda (“Any enemy of Russia must always be a friend of Finland”) also became allies of the fascists, and not necessarily the obligatory war became inevitable.
Finland has been preparing for war long ago. A quarter of the budget was spent on military purposes. Germany, the USA, England, Sweden and France well equipped the Finnish army. For example, in 1935-1938. Finland devoured a third of only one English military export. By the spring of 1939, a network of aerodromes was built, ten times larger than the needs of the then Finnish Air Force (270 aircraft).
In the summer of 1939, the Finns held the largest maneuvers in their history on the Karelian Isthmus. The Chief of the General Staff of the Ground Forces of Germany, F. Halder, inspected the Finnish troops, paying particular attention to the Leningrad and Murmansk operational-strategic directions. The German Foreign Ministry promised in the event of failure to subsequently compensate the Finns for losses. Since October, the Finns carried out a general mobilization and evacuation of the population from Helsinki and border areas. The commission of the Finnish parliament, having examined the concentration areas in October, came to the conclusion that Finland is ready for war. The Foreign Minister ordered the Finnish delegation to end negotiations in Moscow.
30 November 1939, the Soviet government ordered the troops of the Leningrad Military District (Commander KA Meretskov) to repel provocations, at the same time once again inviting Finland to conclude a treaty of friendship and mutual assistance. Finland declared war on the Soviet Union. The 15 of the Soviet rifle divisions, the 6 of which were fully combatant, engaged the 15 infantry divisions of the Finns. I will not describe the course of the war, because, unlike other fronts, there is some literature on the Finnish war. For example, in the 12-languorous "History of the 2 World War I", 8 pages are devoted to it. I will only note that during the war it turned out that our troops “needed additional training on how to break through the system of powerful reinforced concrete fortifications and overcome densely mined wooded and swampy areas in difficult conditions, with 40 — 45-degree frosts and deep snow cover”. Sorry for the long quotation, but I personally can not imagine even how to undertake such “additional training”. Nevertheless, the methods were found, the Finns were divided at a loss ratio of about one to two. The classic ratio for this type of hostilities is one in three. Moreover, the main losses were incurred in the secondary sector of the front, where Finnish skiers squeezed our division on the forest road, and not at all during the breakthrough of the Mannerheim line or the storming of Vyborg.
The end of the first stage of world war.
From Spain, our units were withdrawn at the same time as the international brigades, in the autumn of 1938, only advisers and instructors remained. The Spanish government agreed to this under pressure from the “Committee on Non-intervention”. Naturally, soon, in March of 1939, the Republic fell. Soviet advisers were evacuated at the risk of their lives (and what was without risk for them?). Before this, in February, England and France recognized the Franco regime and severed relations with the republican government. But the Republic still held Madrid and all of central Spain at that time!
This is perhaps even more vile than the Munich deal. The Soviet Union could do nothing. All the ways to Spain were blocked, the fascists, taking advantage of domination in the Mediterranean, drowned our "Igreki" (transports with weapons).
In Asia in the summer of 1938, the war spread to our territory near Lake Hassan, and although the Japanese were knocked out pretty quickly, not everything in the actions of our units was good. The air war in China was taking on an increasingly debilitating form. In 1939, the groups of our pilots lost their members to 3 / 4. China suffered defeat after defeat, the Japanese armies steadily went to the West, the Japanese flotilla climbed along the Yangtze, despite the massive raids of Soviet bombers. On our Far Eastern (and Western) borders, border guards and parts of the NKVD fought a continuous, daily, albeit quiet, war. The Japanese invaded the territory of Mongolia.
The truce proposed by Hitler in the midst of the fierce Soviet-Japanese battles at Khalkhin Gol and in Central China was unexpected for everyone, especially for the Japanese. Apparently, Hitler calculated that, splitting off without interference with the “corrupted cosmopolitan West”, he would gain more than the Soviet Union would gain by finishing with Germany’s Far Eastern ally. The psychology of the nationalist sometimes just touches! And we did not have to choose. Even a limited war on two fronts was too hard for us then. And then such a gift! As a result, for the first time in many decades Russia has completely crushed an entirely serious external enemy army. Moreover, the warlords of the new generation showed themselves well and were not part of the “Spanish” or “Chinese” cohorts.
It should be noted - because of the seemingly easy victory at the end of the war, we now somehow underestimate the Japanese army. This is deeply wrong - the Japanese just met in 1945 with the best soldiers of the 20th century. And on Khalkhin Gol in 1939, it could turn differently!
The Japanese, deeply insulted by Hitler and offended by Zhukov, began to think about more attractive objects of aggression. Our relations with the Chinese government were complicated by relations with Chinese communists that were too warm, according to Chiang Kai-shek. In April, 1941, a neutrality agreement was concluded with Japan. In May, 1941, Stalin, at a reception in honor of graduates of military academies in the Kremlin, declared the inevitability of war with Germany.
In 1941, our troops were withdrawn from China. Behind there were spaces of Eurasia, studded with graves of comrades.
What was to come?
“We raised the coffin to shoulder level and inserted it into the top row of niches. We watched as the worker quickly, deftly, with a spatula immured a hole.
- What is the inscription to do? The caretaker asked.
“There is no need for an inscription,” I replied. - It will lie until without an inscription. Where necessary, they will write about him. ”
That time never came.
Enemies and friends
But what is especially important is the main role of the wars of 1936 — 1941. - At this time, all sorts of masks began to fall apart. People began to understand themselves and others.
What do you think a real communist revolutionary should do when the fascists attack the capital of your country? It turns out that he must raise an armed insurrection. You will say that the author slightly moved on anti-communism. No, it's easier. This is the installation of Trotsky’s notorious iudushka, the so-called “Clemenceau thesis”. He believed that it was in such conditions that it was easiest to take power. It sounds implausible, but it seems even more improbable that in Spain there were people who carried out this instruction. The Trotskyist organization POUM in May 1937, raised a rebellion. The fighting in Barcelona and other cities of the Republic claimed nearly a thousand lives. Thousands were injured, an important offensive in Aragon was foiled, the purpose of which was to help the Northern Front, which was why Bilbao was lost. Therefore, for the Spaniards, Trotsky became the fiend of hell, and it was the Spaniard who killed him in 1940.
By the way, the English Trotskyist Orwell, who had just visited Spain, expressed his vision of the world in the dystopia 1984 a few years later, and the attitude of the Trotskyist to the power of the people in the evil satire Animal Farm.
But his vision of the world, based on the same experience, is expressed in the book For Whom the Bell Tolls by a certain Hemingway. By the way, one Moscow pensioner quite recently could tell something about how it was written and about whom. Alas, "the oldest saboteur of the planet" Ilya Starinov recently died.
So our intervention in the war against fascism raised the authority of the Soviet Union to such a height that even the Western intelligentsia fell in love with us (no matter how odious this word is now). As a result, the Soviet Union received many friends, not only among the world's poorest people. In particular, the beginning of cooperation with our intelligence of the most intelligent and disinterested agents, who came to us for ideological reasons, dates back to this time.
"Ahead of fifty years of undeclared wars, and I signed a contract for the whole term."
And when a Chinese peasant in soldier's uniform, who mainly waged war with Japan, saw that there are officers who do not beat soldiers, do not buy concubines, do not trade soldiers rice, do not shake at the sight of a dollar, do not like either the Japanese or the British and fear nothing, - hope appeared in his centenary struggle for the freedom of China.
And the “enlightened West” ... It happened that the anti-aircraft guns of American warships beat Soviet bombers, covering the Japanese convoys on the Yangtze. Japanese tanks from American steel went on American gasoline. The word "Munich" describes the Anglo-French policy in Europe. It is less known that their policies in Asia received the name "Far Eastern Munich". But France and England threw a tantrum to the whole world, almost got together to fight when the USSR moved the territory of the Hitlerite ally from its second capital a few kilometers.
The fact is that we did not consider the events of that time from class, Marxist positions. The ruling circles of England and France believed that the emerging world conflict was a form of class struggle, and that Hitler and Mussolini, despite their anti-Western rhetoric, were their allies in eliminating proletarian internationalism. The apotheosis of such a policy was the end of 1938 - the beginning of 1939, when the fascists were withdrawn by the Anglo-French "politicians" to the borders of the Soviet Union. So a dangerous beast is released into the arena along the corridor from the bars. But fascism was not a dangerous, but a very dangerous beast! And the defeat of the Anglo-French 1940, the shame and humiliation of Vichy and Dunkirk were the logical outcome. Not often in human history, retribution for the stupidity and cynicism of politicians is so quick and effective. The West did not like the government of the Popular Front (far from being communist) - and it gave Spain to the fascists. The West did not like the USSR - and it gave the fascists Europe! Interestingly, Western politicians did not understand anything, and Churchill even had the audacity to reproach Stalin in his memoirs for a temporary truce with Hitler!
Similar "thin calculations" of the West can be observed now. Take the war in Bosnia and compare with the war in Spain - a one-to-one coincidence. Expanding NATO at the expense of Central Europe and pushing this organization to the borders of Russia, the Anglo-French-Americans sincerely believe in their ability to maintain their control over NATO. Well, time will tell. The only major difference from the situation of 30's is that there is no Soviet Union in the world now.
Unlearned lessons
It is difficult to say in whose favor the first stage of world war ended. Yes, we have defended our borders and even slightly advanced them to the West. We redirected the Japanese. But they did not gain allies. Although there were victories, everyone we supported was defeated. We lost a lot of brave and skilled military specialists.
And the saddest thing. Our enemies took advantage of our respite. The Soviet leadership believed that the commanders of the new generation, who had grown up in a modern war, could lead the troops. The commander of the Air Force became the hero of the Spanish and Chinese wars, Lieutenant General P.V. Rychagov, and the most important Special Western Military District was headed by Col. Gen. DGPavlov, the organizer of some famous operations in Spain, an ardent supporter of the use of tank and mechanized corps.
Nevertheless, Stalin, before the war, apparently, felt a certain anxiety. At a well-known meeting of the high command of the army in December 1940, an operational-strategic game was held. The cavalryman Zhukov played for the blue side (western), and the tankman Pavlov played for the red. The result was unexpected: in Zhukov’s delicate expression, “for the east side, the game was full of dramatic moments.” Stalin was displeased, but apparently satisfied with Pavlov’s opinion that everything happens at the exercises. In addition, Pavlov’s report on the use of mechanized troops at the meeting was bright, well-reasoned, and attracted general attention.
There were some serious contradictions between Stalin and the leadership of the Air Force. Shortly before 22 June 1941, they even splashed out when Levers insulted Stalin at a military meeting, saying that he was forcing the pilots to fly in coffins. This was precisely an emotional breakdown, as it is possible to blame Stalin’s government for anything, but only the most rabid critics can say that it did not want to give the army what it needed, or that Stalin did not care about aviation.
But in June-July 1941, the troops of the Western Front were defeated, all our tanks were lost. And not because of the low combat qualities of equipment, as they sometimes say, but because of organizational failures - the troops lost controllability, our mechanized corps immediately found themselves without fuel and ammunition.
It's not about the "anti-bullet armor of our tanks." The BT-7 armor was weaker than the main tank of the Wehrmacht T-3, but the gun is more powerful, and they mutually hit each other.
Read the memoirs and Zhukov, and Halder, everything is written there.
This turned out to be similar to the rout, organized by the “eastern side” of G.K. Zhukov at the operational-strategic game six months before.
We also lost aviation. Part of the airfields, partly because of the incorrect, apparently, tactical training. What was a revolution in aviation tactics in 1936 was outdated in 1941. We all remember the tragic episode of the Living and the Dead, when heavy bombers die without escort fighters. Reality was just as tragic. Here is a quotation from Manstein's memoirs about the battles on the Western Dvina: “These days, Soviet aviation did everything in its power to destroy the bridges that fell into our hands with air raids. With surprising stubbornness, at a low altitude one squadron flew after another with a single result — they were shot down. Only in one day, our fighters and anti-aircraft artillery shot down Soviet aircraft 64.
For example, Defense The fleet was up to the task, but the country's air defense, alas, was not. And Stalin was clearly less to blame here than the commander of the country's air defense.
True or not, Heroes of the Soviet Union Pavlov and Levers and several other generals paid with their heads. Such was then the measure of responsibility for the assigned case.
But the school of the first phase of the Second World War was good. Almost the majority of the senior leaders of the 1940 — 1960 Armed Forces passed through Spain and China: Malinovsky and Ravens, Batitsky and Kuznetsov, and many, many others.
While reading the story of the Battle of Stalingrad, I was surprised how many participants of the defense of Madrid were there! The same Voronov, Batov, Shumilov, Rodimtsev, Kolpakchi. This is probably a coincidence.
"He was wounded near Madrid at first,
And at Stalingrad for the fifth time. "
All secret
Once again, I will return to that question, which I have repeatedly come across: why is all this virtually unknown, almost secret?
First, so that the West does not declare us an aggressor (he still declared later). This reason is quite serious, the antidote has not yet been found. After all, not only Germans and Italians found themselves under the Soviet bombs and tank tracks, at worst the Moors from the “wild division”, but also the Spaniards. And not only convinced fascists. If you were on fascist territory, you want, you do not want, and go, fight! From the mobilization you will not turn away. It got to the civilian population. And since the world media were then in about the same hands as they are now, then you can imagine how the actions of the Soviet troops were described. So that's why we tried to close the information as much as possible.
Now - another period of secrecy, rather ugly. If you “ignore” the state of war in which the USSR was from October 23 1936 before the start of the Great Patriotic War, then there is an opportunity to distort some things. Just one example: representatives of the German General Staff were invited to the big exercises of the Red Army 1937 of the year. If you do not know that we fought with Germany at this time, albeit on foreign territory and relatively little blood, then such an invitation definitely looks like evidence of friendly feelings. And this was not the case at all. And this concerns not only the teachings of 1937 of the year.
Epilogue
What is this article written for? Our children no longer know about Alexander Matrosov and Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, what to speak of Thor, Ku-Li-Shen or Lizyukov. So tell them! Only one weapon is left to us in the fight with vile, deceitful and ignorant television, with mentally defective school textbooks - these are our own stories. Tell them that the Soviet government declared war on world fascism 23 on October 1936, and that the soldiers of liberty carried out the order of the Soviet government.
We still remember Stalingrad and Berlin, but we almost forgot about Hassan, Elna, Hingane, Barvenkovo and the Green Brahma, and we don’t know anything about Gwadarrám and Wuhan, Teruel and Hankow.
So tell your children that, of all the governments of the world, only the Soviet leadership realized in 1936 that world fascism must be stopped at any cost, and the Soviet Union threw everything he had then into battle. The best pilots and scouts, tankers and submariners, artillerymen and saboteurs fought and died in burning cities and on the polar plains, in waterless mountains and on rice fields, in Europe and Asia, and maybe not only there.
Brave, modest, funny and businesslike people. The war against fascism began for them long before 22 June 1941 of the year, and for many it ended then. Not always under the red star, sometimes under the red-yellow-violet emblem of the Spanish Republic or the white twelve-pointed star of the Kuomintang, or without any insignia at all - they selflessly gave their lives for someone else and their freedom.
I only know about the fate of the Hero of the Soviet Union Ernst Genrikhovich Shakht: “mind. 1941.
Hero of the Soviet Union Paul Matissovich Arman died in the 1943 year on the Volkhov front. The war against fascism was his seventh year, and for two years he did not live to see Victory.
In the Great Soviet Encyclopedia there is no mention of them.
But ... remember who was the commander of Arman during the first battle of the Soviet tankers against the Nazis? Kombrig Krivoshein? So, when our genius reporter Viktor Temin had to be the first to photograph the Victory Banner (he had such a hobby - the first to take pictures of the victory flags, he did it on Hasan and Khalkhin Gol) - then he turned to the commander of 1 for help Krasnograd mechanized corps Lieutenant General SM Krivoshein. It was his tanks rushed through the park Tiergarten to the Reichstag. And soon the main newspaper of the USSR, Pravda, published three photographs of V. Temin. On the first, as it is easy to guess, the Victory Banner over the Reichstag, and on the second, the tankers of General Krivoshein, resting on the Reichstag.
It was his, the one that went through the great war against fascism from its first day to the last, and it was necessary to ask when this war began and when it ended.
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