The Great Patriotic War and its Impact on the SU 1941-45

Question 1

By the summer of 1941 what was the situation in Europe?

Answer 1

Hitler had been poised for the invasion of Russia - he had been preparing his strategy since Oct 1940
Britain had refused to make peace after the German conquest of France and western Europe, but was not able to offer a military threat
Hitler knew the SU was badly unprepared for war and German forces were experienced and well-equipped so was confident of achieving a rapid and decisive victory

Question 2

When was the invasion initially scheduled for and why was it delayed?

Answer 2

1st June, delayed for three weeks because the policies of Hitler’s Italian allies had caused a crisis in Yugoslavia which compelled Hitler to invade Yugoslavia in another blitzkrieg

Question 3

When was the invasion rescheduled for and why was this significant?

Answer 3

22nd June - at the time the delay didn’t seem significant but it did cut short the time-window for completion of the operation, before winter weather conditions intervened

Question 4

What was the code-name of the invasion of the USSR?

Answer 4

Operation Barbarossa

Question 5

What was blitzkrieg?

Answer 5

Term widely used to define the rapid victories achieved by German armies in conquering Poland in September 1939 and France in 1940, using fast-moving, armoured units, backed by close air support, the invasion of the USSR was intended to be another such ‘lightening war’

Question 6

What was the strategy behind Barbarossa?

Answer 6

Three huge army groups spearheaded the German invasion plan; north through the Baltic States towards Leningrad; south and east into Ukraine; and a central thrust towards Moscow
Some of Hitler’s senior advisers wanted all forces to be concentrated on the central drive in Moscow, but he overruled them

Question 7

What were the aims behind Barbarossa?

Answer 7

Not just military victory - it was an attempt to seize control over the entire soviet economy, and to eradicate communism
Hitler also believed that many Soviet citizens would welcome the German invaders as ‘liberators’

Question 8

What had left the SU unprepared for war in June 1941?

Answer 8

Stalin’s miscalculation about the effectiveness of the Nazi-Soviet Pact - even when foreign sources warned Stalin that a German invasion was imminent, he took no action, partly as he preferred not to believe them and partly as he didn’t want to take any visible steps against invasion in case those steps provoked Hitler into launching it

Question 9

How was the weakness of the Soviet position in June 1941 reflected in Stalin’s actions?

Answer 9

He shrank away from making a radio broadcast to the people (he left it to Molotov)
Stalin seemed to have lost his nerve, expecting that the people and the party leadership would blame him and turn against him

Question 10

When did Stalin eventually make a radio speech to the nation and what did he say?

Answer 10

On the 3rd July - there was a significant change in tone from the terror in the 1930’s, Stalin appealed to Patriotism and religion and to unity among nationalities
‘Friendship’ with Nazi Germany was replaced by ideological hatred- Stalin’s new friend was the British prime minister - Churchill

Question 11

What was the new tone?

Answer 11

A great patriotic war, linked to national struggles of the Russian past, was to be a lasting feature of Soviet war propaganda

Question 12

What else had contributed to Soviet unpreparedness for war?

Answer 12

Soviet military strength had been undermined by the army purges of 1937 to 1939, as had been shown by the poor performance of the Red army in the Winter War against Finland
Soviet resources were also stretched by the need to keep substantial forces in the far east after the 1939 war against Japan

Question 13

Despite the total size of the Soviet armed forces being greatly increased 1939- June 1941, what was the problem and what was the problem with the territorial expansion?

Answer 13

The forces lagged well behind Germany in efficiency, equipment and leadership
Extensive territories in Eastern Poland and the Baltic States that have been seized in 1939 and 1940 to provide a ‘buffer zone’ against attack - provided no defence and were overrun in a matter of weeks

Question 14

In what ways was Stalin guilty of errors and pool leadership in the early stages of war?

Answer 14

He had a panic attack after the invasion and failed to give leadership in the first weeks - he prepared to move the government away from Moscow to Samara on the Volga and only decided last minute to stay in Moscow
He relied for far too long on many inferior commanders, who had been promoted for political reasons after the purge of the army
In September 1941, he helped to cause a massive defeat of his southern armies at Kiev by refusing to allow them to retreat until it was too late - he also showed no urgency in defending Leningrad after it was besieged

Question 15

What happened only after a long series of defeats and disasters?

Answer 15

Stalin’s ‘war cabinet’, Stavka, became an effective mechanism to run the war

Question 16

What key factors was Stalin saved by?

Answer 16

The size of Russia, with it’s huge population and vast distances
The severity of the Russian winter
The patriotism of the soviet people
He also learned from his mistakes and was eventually to receive accolades as ‘the great war hero’

Question 17

How was Stalin helped by advanced information?

Answer 17

Received advanced information about the intentions of Japan - provided by master spy ‘Richard Sorge’ and as a result Stalin was saved from having to fight a two-front war.
When Japan attacked the US naval base at Pearl Harbour in Hawaii in December, this brought the US into the Grand Alliance against the Axis Powers (G, I and J)

Question 18

Define Stavka?

Answer 18

The top-level military command of the USSR in the Great Patriotic War, the name originated in Tsarist times, but Stavka was formed under Stalin on 23rd June 1930
Comprised key generals such as Zhukov as we;; as key politicians like Molotov
It was subordinate only to GKO (the State Defence Committee), which was the supreme political war cabinet

Question 19

What made it possible to avoid war with Japan?

Answer 19

The USSR had fought a major war against them in 1939 and feared that Japan (allied to Hitler in the ‘axis’) would invade the USSR in 1941.
But Stalin was tipped off by Richard Sorge, (soviet double agent who ran a spy ring in Japan), that the target of Japanese aggression would be the US, not Russia
This enabled Stalin to transfer high quality troops from Siberia in time to strengthen the defence in Moscow.

Question 20

Who was Sorge?

Answer 20

He was a Comintern agent, active in Germany from 1929, and in Japan from 1933 - he was executed in Tokyo in 1944

Question 21

What were the three distinct phases in the Great Patriotic War?

Answer 21

1) June 1941 to summer 1942/October: Soviet Russia struggled to survive against successive German offensives, suffering massive losses of people and territory - fighting for survival
2) 1942 to summer 1943: Soviet Russia established its war effort, built a powerhouse war economy and halted German advances - turning the tide
3) 1943 to summer 1945: Soviet armies moved on to the offensive, recaptured vast areas that had been occupied, and achieved total victory - the road to Berlin

Question 22

Who was the USSR part of a grand alliance with and why is this significant ?

Answer 22

Britain (from June 1941 after the German invasion of Russia) and with the US (from December 1941 after the Japanese attack on Hawaii)
Significant as western allies played a massive role in defeat of Germany and Japan as well as supplying crucial supplies to aid USSR’s war effort

Question 23

Who suffered the worst from war?

Answer 23

The SU with enormous human and material losses, and years of brutal occupation = defining experience of the Soviet people under Stalin

Question 24

During the first stage (struggle for survival June 41 to October 42) what was astounding and what is an example of it?

Answer 24

The speed of the German advance, vast distances were covered in day. Huge soviet armies were encircled and defeated
At Minsk and Smolensk, (central front) near Kiev, 665,000 Soviet troops were captured.
Soviet forces also rapidly expelled from Baltic States - on all fronts catastrophic losses of Soviet aircraft

Question 25

After two weeks what did German generals believe?

Answer 25

That the war was virtually won and that Moscow would be captured before the end of August so Hitler was convinced victory was close

Question 26

When was Leningrad encircled and what happened after this?

Answer 26

Early September
Forces were in place for a final advance on Moscow, 1/2 a million troops surrendered after the fall of Kiev on the 19th of September so on the 15th of October, the Soviet leadership offered negotiations for a compromise peace

Question 27

What was Hitler’s response to the offer of compromised peace and what was the outcome?

Answer 27

He disregarded it and kept pursuing total victory
In November, he weather worsened and Soviet defences hardened with some desperate counter-attacks pushing German forces back from the outskirts of Moscow so by December despite being close German victory had not been achieved and on the 5th of December the advance on Moscow was halted

Question 28

What was Stalin’s offer of peace in October and why?

Answer 28

By Oct 1941, huge territories had been lost and German forces were driving towards Moscow -if they succeeded, Stalin knew that Japan was likely to invade from the east
He authorised Molotov and Beria to open secret negotiations with Germany but nothing came of them, Hitler was convinced he would win anyway
Peace offer remained secret until after the collapse of the USSR

Question 29

What did Operation Barbarossa fail to do?

Answer 29

Win decisive victory, the SU was still involved in a desperate war for survival

Question 30

Despite there having been limited fighting in the early months of 1942, what happened in May and why was it unexpected?

Answer 30

Germany was ready to launch another offensive, designed to knock Russia out of the war
It wasn’t towards Moscow as expected, but south and east, towards the Caucasus oilfields

Question 31

What were the outcomes of this renewed attack in 1942 (Case Blue)?

Answer 31

As in 1941, German forces made rapid advances after the launch of Case Blue, with massive victories in Eastern Ukraine - the fall of Rostov on the Don in July was one of the lowest moments for the USSR in the Great Patriotic War

Question 32

What was Case Blue sidetracked by and what was the outcome?

Answer 32

Sidetracked by Hitler’s decision to divert forces to the capture of Stalingrad , on the Volga
Stalingrad became a symbolic battle, Stalin put immense efforts into defending the city and Hitler became obsessed with taking it
August-September Soviet forces desperately defended Stalingrad and from October the balance changed
German forces began to pull back from the Caucasus, and the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad was cut off an encircled

Question 33

During the German advances of 1941/2, what did German victory depend on and why?

Answer 33

Speed - Hitler always knew the military balance would turn against Germany if it came a long war of attrition
Most of Germany’s military resources went into the invading army groups, there were no mass forces in reserve
Transport behind the advance was stretched over vast distances, Hitler’s generals also began to realise that they had underestimated the number of Soviet forces, when Barbarossa began the Germans believed they faced about 200 Soviet divisions, by August they had identified at least 360

Question 34

How did the USSR defend Stalingrad?

Answer 34

In late summer of 1942 - seemed certain it would fall to the Germans as 9/10’s of the city was in their hands
Soviet forces held one enclave on the Volga, supplied at night by boats across the river. Stalin had refused the evacuate the civilian population saying ‘they will fight harder for a live city than a dead one’ but the USSR was building up new armies and new weapons
By 1942, it was the Germans who were on the defensive, fighting for survival and on Hitler’s direct order, forbidden to retreat

Question 35

What effect did Hitler’s strategic mistake in persisting with defending Stalingrad to the death have?

Answer 35

Made the battle into a catastrophic German defeat, psychologically as well as militarily
The war had become the long war the Germans had always wanted to avoid
Vast new Soviet armies had a decisive impact on the final outcome of Stalingrad and regain of Rostov 3 weeks later

Question 36

By early 1943 what problems did Hitler face and what did he do?

Answer 36

He was running out of men, resources and time
He launched Operation Citadel, a great offensive near Kursk in July but the offensive was halted by massive Soviet firepower at the battle of Prokhorovka

Question 37

What was the battle of Prokhorovka and what was the outcome?

Answer 37

The biggest tank battle in history - decisively won by the Red Army, with its massed force of T-34 tanks
Hitler called off the Kursk offensive on July 13th but the battle became a springboard for Soviet forces to counter-attack and to regain huge territories from German occupation

Question 38

What was the situation in the USSR in 1934 and how did this lead to the T-34 tank?

Answer 38

The USSR had fully mobilised its economy - there was surge in production of guns, tanks and aircraft, mostly from vast armaments factories east of the Urals
This surge equipped the Red Army with the T-34 (a key military asset)

Question 39

What was good about the T-34?

Answer 39

Compared to the most advanced German tanks it had a less sophisticated design and engineering but it immensely durable and easy to maintain and repair
Mass production of it was the foundation for victory in the great tank battle at Kursk 1943

Question 40

After Kursk what was clear?

Answer 40

Soviet victory - war no longer desperate defence of USSR but instead about rebounding into an offensive that would drive the Germans all the way back from Berlin

Question 41

What happened from August 1943- December 1944?

Answer 41

There were a chain of soviet victories stretching across Eastern Europe, reconquering Ukraine, lifting the siege of Leningrad and invading Poland, Lithuania, Romania and Hungary

Question 42

What happened in November 1943?

Answer 42

Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill met at Tehran, the first summit conference of the ‘big three’ to discuss what to do with the allied victory which was now inevitable

Question 43

What did ultimate victory prove difficult?

Answer 43

The retreating German forces proved resilient - even the bomb plot that nearly killed Hitler in July 1944, Germany continued to fight and millions more lives were lost
When Stalin met Churchill in Moscow in October 1944, victory was still far off
April 1945 before the Red Army reached Berlin

Question 44

How badly was the USSR destroyed by war and why?

Answer 44

Mass destruction during the German advance and by Soviet scorched earth tactics as they Red Army retreated
During the Soviet fight back, the same areas that had been smashed by invasion were fought over again e.g. Kharkiv won/lost four times
1700 Soviet towns and cities devastated with 70,000 villages

Question 45

What are some examples of the harsh life for civilians on the Home Front?

Answer 45

Food, fuel and shelter were all in short supply
Leningrad was under siege from autumn 1941 to spring 1944
600,000 died from hunger and cold
There was massive destruction of factories, hospitals and urban housing

Question 46

What is it estimated that by 1945 civilian deaths totalled?

Answer 46

More than 12 million

Question 47

What was normal life dislocated by?

Answer 47

The displacement effect of the German invasion
Mobilisation for the armed forces or work in munitions factories and by mass deportations
Many hardships were the side effect of military conflict but other causes included, atrocities by German occupiers, repressive measures by Soviet against it’s own people
However also a sense of making sacrifices to fight in a great national cause

Question 48

When launching the invasion what was Nazi leaders talked about and was there truth in this?

Answer 48

Liberating the subject nationalities in the USSR from a communist system they hated, there were some examples of Germans being welcomed e.g. in parts of Ukraine/Baltic states but it didn’t last - Hitler and even Stalin were surprised by the loyalty of Soviet people
Local populations were quickly alienated by the repressive actions and atrocities committed by German occupiers

Question 49

What were some of the brutal actions of the Germans?

Answer 49

Thousands of Soviet soldiers were held as prisoners of war, few ever came home
Thousands of Soviet workers were conscripted to work in German war factories
Hitler ordered the instant execution of captured Soviet commissars
There were massacres and deportations of Jews as well as vicious reprisals against the bands of partisans who harassed German forces behind the lines

Question 50

What was Babi Yar?

Answer 50

Hitler saw the war in the east as a racial war - invading the USSR was accompanied by widespread deportations and massacres of Jews
Soon after the occupation of Kiev in September 1941m the SS began rounding up the Jewish population for extermination
34,000 were taken to Babi Yar, shot and put into mass graves

Question 51

How did Soviet citizens also suffer at the hands of their own government?

Answer 51

Commissars and secret police were obsessed with hunting down ‘slackers and deserters’ with thousands arrested or executed
The regime = intensely suspicious of ethnic minorities who might collaborate with the Germans, such as Chechens and the Crimean Tatars
When Western areas of the USSR were liberated, Stalin treated PoWs and those who had worked for the Germans, harshly

Question 52

Who were the Crimean Tatars and what happened to them?

Answer 52

They had seen themselves as a nation since the 15th century, strongly influenced by the Ottoman empire
Many died in the civil war and during forced collectivisation + the great famine
Stalin was suspicious of their separate national identity even though had served in the Red Army so in May 1944, Beria organised the mass deportation of the entire Tatar population (240,000) to Uzbekistan in Soviet Central Asia
Their descendants returned to live in Crimea after Ukraine became independent in 1991

Question 53

What great national myth emerged out of the war and was it true?

Answer 53

Of a united soviet people pulling together through shared sacrifices, following the great leader Stalin to a heroic victory
Not entirely true - many criticised the regime and were punished for by it (many examples of corrupt and selfish behaviour from Party officials)
Some truth - the experience of total war and propaganda campaigns did bring people together .

Question 54

What were some unifying factors during the war?

Answer 54

Fear and hatred for the Germans
Deep patriotism in defending the Motherland
An underlying faith in the revolution and in Stalin

Question 55

What did the German invasion and occupation of the USSR in 1941 and early 1942 do?

Answer 55

Destroyed the basis of the Soviet economy, in industry and in agriculture. Vast areas were occupied
Whole sectors of industry were ruined by bombardment or deliberately destroyed before the Soviet forces had to retreat
Much of the new industrial capacity that had been gained in the 1930’s was lost - if the SU couldn’t build a new industrial base, the war would be lost

Question 56

What was the solution for the destruction of industry?

Answer 56

Relocate in order to rebuild - equipment, workers and whole factories were packed up and put on 20,000 trains and shifted hundreds of miles east, beyond the reach of German bombs
Total war in the SU = more total than it was in B or G

Question 57

When did the evacuation of industrial plans became urgent and how did it happen?

Answer 57

Urgent in August 1941
Many factories were dismantled and moved to the Urals
Railroads made evacuation possible; 3000 wagons a day took steel factory equipment from the Dnieper area, 3000 per day the electrical industry, 25,000 wagons in one week shifted factories from Ukraine and 80,000 wagons moved 500 factories from Moscow

Question 58

Was the relocation/mobilisation of industry a success?

Answer 58

Vital success for the war effort

It was another industrial revolution

Question 59

Was the Centrally-controlled command economy a good thing and what happened in 1942?

Answer 59

It had vee inefficient and ill-suited to peacetime conditions but the centralised system was very well matched to the needs of total war
During 1942 the SU began to built a huge industrial base for war production: especially guns, tanks and aircraft (foundations of Soviet aircraft industry had been made by Andrei Tupolev in the 20’s and 30’s but the losses of 1941 meant it necessary to start again)

Question 60

After 1945 what did news reports and school textbooks in the SU say little about?

Answer 60

The foreign aid poured into the USSR by the Allies under Lend-Lease but the US has send Russia huge quantities of armaments, industrial goods and foodstuffs

Question 61

What were the two main routes for the vital supply line US —> SU?

Answer 61

The Arctic Convoys - at the end of a fragile maritime lifeline, across the Atlantic to Britain and then via the north sea and north Russia
The Persian corridor - safer, more roundabout route, through the Persian gulf and across Iran to the Caspian sea - from here it was easy to transfer goods to Baku and the Volga river region or eastwards to factories beyond the Urals

Question 62

While a wide range of goods were supplied, what were particularly vital? + how much of an impact?

Answer 62

More than 300,000 American trucks as the Soviet rail network was badly hit early in the war and heavy-duty trucks were essential for transportation and lend-lease supplied them in huge quantities
The flow of these supplied was significant to the Soviet war effort, especially in the 1942-3 winter when the USSR was recovering from heavy losses earlier in war