Stalin's Missed Chance (Упущенный шанс Сталина. Советский Союз и борьба за Европу: 1939-1941 Stalin's Missed Chance: The Soviet Union and the Struggle for Europe: 1939-1941) is a study by the Russian military historian Mikhail Ivanovich Meltyukhov, the author of several books and articles on Soviet military history.
Stalin's Missed Chance covers a theory of a planned Soviet invasion raised by Viktor Suvorov, the author of highly controversial books such as Icebreaker. Unlike Suvorov's works, Meltyukhov's book is based on archive materials, some of which were until recently classified. Contrary to many Western scholars (David Glantz, John D. Erickson, Richard Overy, and others), Meltyukhov concurs with Suvorov's claim that Stalin and the Soviet military leadership had planned an offensive against Nazi Germany in 1941.
Meltyukhov rejects, however, Suvorov's claims that the German assault (Operation Barbarossa) was a pre-emptive strike. Meltyukhov affirms both sides had been preparing to invade the other but that neither believed the possibility of the other striking first.
Stalin's Missed Chance is an extensive study of archive sources and often quotes and summarizes wartime records of the Red Army and of the Soviet Union. The book also draws on a legion of published primary sources from 1939 to 1941.
On the eve of World War II According to Mikhail Meltyukhov, Russia had lost its position as a Great Power during the Great War, the Russian Revolution, and the subsequent breakup of the Russian Empire. The Soviet leadership had the choices either to accept the regional status of the Soviet Union or to become a great power once again. Having decided for the latter, the Soviet leadership used Communist ideology (the Comintern, the idea of world revolution etc.) to strengthen its position.Meltyukhov 2000:491 The key objective was to exclude a possible alliance of Capitalist countries. Although diplomatic relationships had been established with the capitalist countries, he does not believe that the Soviet Union was accepted as an equal partner.
That changed, however, in the course of the political crisis of 1939, when two military and political blocs formed: Anglo-French and German-Italian, both of which were interested in an agreement with the Soviets. Moscow had the opportunity to choose with either and under what conditions to negotiate.
Its basic goal was to retain neutrality and, after both belligerent sides were weakened, to emerge as the decisive factor in ensuring victory for one side. Thus, "the USSR succeeded in staying out of the European war, after obtaining in this case a significant free hand in Eastern Europe, wider space to maneuver in its own interests between the belligerent sides."Meltyukhov 2000:491-2
During the years 1939 and 1940, the Soviets annexed several Eastern European countries and territories. The Kremlin believed that Germany was a force capable of weakening the British position and shaking the capitalist order. And "then at the suitable moment the Red Army could have destroyed Germany and would have freed Europe both from fascism and from 'rotten capitalism.'"Meltyukhov 2000:492-4
As for the Soviet-German relationship during 1940, Meltyukhov points out that although both sides had the common goal of weakening Britain and negotiations were held in November 1940, a military alliance was never realised. The Soviets would have had to leave the whole European continent to the German-Italian sphere of influence, which would relegate the Soviets to a second-rate role in the world matters.Meltyukhov 2000:494
New phase From that time onward, Germany was the main obstacle for Soviet penetration into Europe, and the relationship between the two nations entered a new phase. Both sides began preparing for the conflict.Meltyukhov 2000:495
The Soviets took steps to normalize relations with the Western governments (including French leaders). These negotiations intensified as rumours spread about a possible Soviet-German military conflict. In June 1941, the Soviets proposed negotiations with Germany, which could have deceived the Germans and provided justification for an assault if the talks broke down.Meltyukhov 2000:496
From early 1941, measures were taken for increased combat readiness in the Western boundary districts, a large part of which was to be completed by July 1. The Soviet economy approached war footing, and the country had prepared for troop mobilization since 1939.
According to Meltyukhov, the material resources and system of mobilization ensured the development of the army. He claims the Red Army considerably exceeded the German army in the quantity of armaments and combat materials (Meltyukhov 2000:497).
Soviet and German offensive plans As Meltyukhov asserts with his study, the General Staff of the Red Army had already begun developing a plan for an assault on Germany in October 1939. The process intensified in March 1940, and at least four different versions of the plan were developed throughout 1940 and 1941. The concentration of troops was disguised as maneuvers; in May/June 1941 the preparation for a Soviet invasion of Germany reached the final stage, as the full-scale concentration of troops began.Meltyukhov 2000:497
The draft plan from March 11, 1941 demanded to "start the offensive [on] 12.6.", which in Meltyukhov's opinion should refute the affirmation of GorodetskyГородецкий Г. Миф "Ледокола": Накануне войны. Пер. с англ. М.,1995. С.284. that the draft assumed defensive strategy."Наступление начать 12.6." - Meltyukhov 2000:386f. The author refers to Гареев М.А. Неоднозначные страницы войны. (Очерки о проблемных вопросах Великой Отечественной войны). М.,1995. С.93; also: 1941 год. Документы. Кн.1. С.741—746 As it is known, the precise date of the outbreak of war is determined by the side which plans to strike first. Thus, Meltyyukhov thinks that the idea that the Red Army must strike first (clearly formulated in Zhukov's plan from May 15, 1941) was in a concealed form already present in all the previous drafts.
As for the usual suggestions that the Red Army was preparing a counteroffensive, a possible Wehrmacht invasion is suggested in plans cited by Meltyukhov, but with obvious lack of depth since the estimation of the enemy's intentions, with exception of the possible direction of the main attack, did not undergo substantial changes. Furthermore, Meltyukhov claims those plans did not proceed from factual data and that two possible Wehrmacht assault directions (the southern version, through Ukraine, and the northern version, through Lithuania and Latvia, which was abandoned later) were taken into consideration, and an assault on Belarus was excluded without any reason. Thus, one might wonder if that was merely guesswork. Aleksandr Vasilevsky has recalled himselfНовая и новейшая история. 1992. № 6. С.7. that there was no straight answer to the probability of a German invasion and that no possible timing discussed.Meltyukhov 2000:379-80 That fact and the absence of a connection between a possible strike by the enemy and the actions of the Red Army make the suggestion of a 'counter-strike strategy' very implausible to Meltyukhov.Meltyukhov 2000:413
On the other hand, the concentration of Red Army on the borders was elaborated throughout different plans (Meltyukhov reports five different versions) and went through substantial changes. As also indicated by M. A. Gareyev, who is himself skeptical of the Soviet strike thesis, "the direction of the concentration of basic efforts by Soviet command was chosen not in the interests of the strategic defensive operation (this operation was simply not provided and was not planned), and conformably entirely to other methods of operations."Meltyukhov 2000:381
Military actions would have begun with the surprise blow by the Soviet Air Force on the airfields of Eastern Prussia, Poland and Romania. The overall Soviet superiority in aviation would have made it possible to subject German airfields in a 250 km-deep border zone to continuous airstrikes, which would have led to a significant weakening of the enemy and would have facilitated Red Army ground forces operations. The ground forces were supposed to have two major strike directions: one striking towards Eastern Prussia and Poland and the other into Romania in the South.Meltyukhov 2000:503
The basic idea of Soviet military planning consisted in the fact that the Red Army was to concentrate near the border under the disguise of maneuvers and to go over into a sudden, decisive attack. "The absence of any references to the possible defensive operations of the Red Army shows that the discussion was not about the preparation for a pre-emptive strike but for the assault on Germany and its allies. This idea is clearly expressed in the document of May 15, 1941, by which the Red Army was to be guided in the beginning of war." Meltyukhov suggests that the assault on Germany was initially planned to take place on June 12, 1941 but that it was postponed because the Soviet leadership feared an Anglo-German reconciliation against the Soviet Union after the flight of Rudolf Hess on May 12, 1941.Meltyukhov 2000:498-9
The basis for that assumption is revealed by Molotov's recollection 40 years later in a conversation with Russian journalist Ivan Stadnyuk: "I don't remember all the motives for cancelling this decision, but it seems to me that Hitler's deputy Rudolf Hess' flight to England played the main role there. The NKVD reconnaissance reported to us, that Hess on behalf of Hitler had proposed the United Kingdom to conclude peace and to participate in the military march against the USSR... If we at this time would have unleashed ourselves a war against Germany, would have moved forces to Europe, then England could have entered the alliance with Germany without any delay... And not only England. We could have been face to face with the entire capitalist world".Стаднюк И.С. Нечто о сталинизме//О них ходили легенды. М.,1994. С.423—424.
Meltyukhov believes that "the question about the new period of the completion of war build-up was solved on May 24, 1941, at the secret conference of military-political leadership at the Kremlin. Now accessible sources show that the full concentration and the development of the Red Army on Soviet Western districts was to be completed by July 15, 1941. The rate of the concentration of the Red Army on the Western borders was increased. Together with the transfer of 77 divisions of the second strategic echelon, from June 12 to June 16, 1941, began another dislocation of troops of the second echelon of the armies and the reserves of the military districts near the western border.Meltyukhov 2000: 499
As for the German offensive plans, Meltyukhov points out that the German leadership hoped for a rapid crushing defeat of the USSR which would have given Germany necessary resources for victory in a long war with England and maybe the United States. Hitler's idea could thus be characterised as striving for a victory in the East for the purpose of winning the war against the West.Meltyukhov 2000:500
Therefore, Meltyukhov claims, the explanations by Nazi leaders of a pre-emptive strike against the Soviet Union were groundless, since Hitler had regarded the concentration of Soviet troops as merely defensive. Operation Barbarossa was scheduled a long time before, and Hitler hadn't really comprehended the Soviet invasion threat. The concentration of Soviet troops was interpreted as a defensive reaction to the discovered Wehrmacht deployment. With regards to the failure of the Soviet leadership to comprehend the German threat, Stalin had not believed Hitler was going to invade and risk war on two fronts.Meltyukhov 2000:502
Besides, it is believed that Stalin was expecting a German ultimatum, which made the Soviets evaluate the concentration of troops as pressure tactic.
Had the Soviet assault taken place