On September 9, 1939, the whole of Europe was stunned by the sudden upheaval.

One of the three main subjects of the Polish Confederation, and also the largest and most resource-rich subject, the army of the Free State of Ukraine announced its surrender to the German army!

Hundreds of thousands of heavily armed troops surrendered to the thousands of German servicemen who were actually surrounded by them. Foreign journalists in the city of Lviv saw the most absurd and joyful surrender of all time.

A war correspondent for the British newspaper The Times wrote: "...... About 1,000 very tall, handsome, and well-dressed German Waffen-SS soldiers arrived in a neat line from the Lviv airport. They are certainly the most popular aggressors of all time, welcoming Ukrainians along the way, each with a paper German flag (swastika, it seems to have been prepared a long time ago) in their hands, waving desperately, shouting in German: Thank you!

As if these German devils were not the aggressors of all evil, but the saviors who came to liberate Ukraine!

In fact, this is the opinion of most of the inhabitants of Lviv, including Jews and Ukrainians (Ukrainians outside Lviv, and Ukrainians and Jews are the most populated inside, and there are also some Poles). When they learned that it was not the Soviet Red Army but the Germans who had landed at the airfield, the whole city celebrated, and every Ukrainian looked like he had survived the catastrophe.

The parliament of the Free State of Ukraine in Lviv immediately passed a resolution to surrender to Germany, and asked the German emperor to immediately send more troops to complete the occupation of the entire Ukrainian state as soon as possible......"

……

"This, this, this...... Are these Ukrainians all crazy? Are they all crazy? ”

At a meeting of the British Cabinet, Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain could not believe his ears after listening to the report of the Foreign Secretary.

There are so many people in Europe who want to be Germans!

"Lviv was originally a German city, it was originally called Lemberg, 20 years ago it belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Austrian Empire, and now Germany and Austria have completed the merger, which can also be regarded as inheriting the legal system of the Austrian Empire. Perhaps in the eyes of the citizens of Lemberg, Germany is their homeland......"

Viscount Halifax tried to explain: "In other parts of the Ukrainian Free State, people may not welcome German troops like this. ”

It turns out that the Ukrainians in Lviv were originally Germans!

"But it's not allowed!" Winston. Churchill was a little annoyed, he was so happy to be invaded, is Germany really that good?

"But it's not a bad thing for us," Churchill thought for a moment, and then said, "Ukraine was a problem, now it belongs to Germany, and if Stalin wants to take Ukraine, he should declare war on Germany!" ”

The question of Ukraine's affiliation has always been a difficult problem when it comes to drawing the Soviet Union into the war. Ukraine is too rich and too big, and it is impossible for the Polish Confederation to give it up - they gave up Ukraine for the sake of a denzer, isn't this picking up a sesame seed and throwing away the watermelon?

And it is impossible for the Soviet Union to give up its demands on Ukraine, not to Ukraine, and then to help White Poland, which must perish in Lenin's will, to fight Germany, even Stalin will not be able to sit firmly on the throne of general secretary.

"That's true," Chamberlain thought for a moment, always feeling that things were not so simple, "what if Hitler and Stalin reached an agreement on the partition of Ukraine?" ”

"In that case......," Churchill frowned, "we're in big trouble!" Because Stalin will not take only part of Ukraine, he will swallow the eastern lands of the Polish state, which originally belonged to Belarus, along with them! ”

"The USSR will go to war with Poland?"

Churchill nodded. Absolutely! If the Soviet Union took half or most of the Ukrainian Free States, then what reason was there to spare Poland?

"So what do we do?" Chamberlain felt some scalp tingling. If the Soviet Union had fallen to Germany, it would have meant that Poland would soon be doomed. The armored forces of the Germans will soon be able to be transferred to the western theater.

"Maybe we're going to think about carrying out a plan to bomb the Baku oil fields!" Winston. Churchill said, "Because most of the Germans' oil comes from the big oil fields of Baku and Transcaucasia, if we can blow them up, the German war machine will soon cease to function because of the lack of oil." ”

At present, Germany's fuel supply is mainly in three parts, one is imported from the Soviet Union, the second is imported from Romania, and the third is domestic synthetic fuel. In addition, there is the strategic petroleum reserve, which has been slowly hoarded since the early 20s and now has as much as 20 million tons.

However, Britain did not know the true situation of Germany's strategic petroleum reserves, nor did they know the production capacity of synthetic fuels - the latest information told by the Bureau of Strategic Deception to Britain, France and the Soviet Union was that there were 3 million tons of oil reserves and 2 million tons of synthetic fuel per year, while Germany's wartime oil (including synthetic fuel consumption) was 10 million tons.

That is, without oil from the USSR and Romania, the German war machine would last only a few months at best.

So now the British envoy is lobbying in Romania with a checkbook: as long as Romania is willing to destroy the Ploiesti oil fields, Britain will immediately pay 60 million dollars! If Romania is not willing to destroy oil fields, then Britain is also willing to buy Romanian oil at a high price.

However, Romania's oil production is not at all comparable to that of the Soviet Union, and the two are not the same grade. Britain naturally judged that once the Soviet Union stopped supplying oil to Germany, Germany's war machine would not be able to fight for a long time.

……

Stalin already knew a little bit of information about the bomber groups that Britain and France were massing in the Middle East - the Soviet intelligence services were still capable, even if they were purged.

However, the British and French massing bombers in the Middle East was aimed at bombing the Soviet Union, and the military intelligence of the Soviet Red Army did not dare to make this conclusion, and it could not listen to it. This matter is basically the top military secret of Britain and France, and only a few high-ranking officials such as the new commander of the Eastern Army, General Wei Gang, are known in the Middle East.

The General Staff of the Red Army thus came to a conclusion that seemed more plausible: Britain and France deployed bombers in the Middle East to deter pro-German Iran and Iraq, and also to put pressure on Turkey, the source of German chromite, an important raw material for the military industry.

But Stalin was not in the mood to think about what the British and French planes were doing in the Middle East, because he, like the British cabinet ministers, was stunned by the upheaval in Ukraine.

"I was wrong!" Stalin had not been wrong for many years, but when he heard that the Ukrainians were happily surrendering to Germany, he admitted his mistake at a meeting of the Political Bureau: "I have seriously underestimated the counter-revolutionary situation in right-bank Ukraine!" ”

Stalin reprimanded in a very sad tone: "I am wrong to deal with the Ukrainian problem with empiricism without investigation and research!" What is happening in Lviv now shows that on the west bank of the Dnieper, the number of reactionary elements of all kinds in the population is not 8 or 10 percent, but tens of percent! ”

He glanced at Khrushchev, who also looked distressed. Khrushchev said: "Comrade General Secretary, it is not your fault, the main thing is that I, the first secretary of Ukraine, did not do a good job, and I underestimated the counter-revolutionary situation on the right bank...... It is clearly the last bastion of all kinds of reactionary elements in all of Russia, a stronghold of counter-revolutionaries! ”

"Well, Comrade Khrushchev," Stalin's tone was already lowered, "do you have the confidence to destroy them?" ”

Khrushchev immediately stood up and said categorically: "I promise to complete the task and completely destroy the reactionary elements of the right-bank Ukraine, leaving not a single one!" ”

It's a daunting task!

Stalin was very satisfied with Khrushchev's statement, but in order to eliminate all kinds of reactionaries in right-bank Ukraine, Khrushchev alone could not do it.

"Comrade Voroshilov!" The Fatherly Leader of the USSR named the People's Commissar of Defense.

"Comrade Stalin, the Belarusian Front of the Red Army and the Ukrainian Front are ready to launch an offensive against reactionary Poland and reactionary Ukraine at any time!"

Stalin looked at Voroshilov and said, "Comrade People's Commissar of Defense, who do you think is the enemy of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army?" ”

That's a problem! Now the Free State of Poland Ukraine has happily surrendered to Germany...... So is Voroshilov's Red Army now going to fight against the German-Ukrainian coalition? Look at the Germans' performance when they beat Poland, it seems to be very difficult to deal with!

Can the Soviet Red Army fight?

"Comrade General Secretary, if we are going to war with Germany...... Voroshilov feels that the problem is somewhat thorny, "we must make an alliance with Britain and France. ”

"An alliance with Britain and France?" Stalin snorted, "Same as Tsar Nicholas II?" ”

Voroshilov shuddered for a moment, and quickly changed his words: "Comrade General Secretary, I didn't mean that...... I mean it's not good for us to go to war with Germany. ”

Stalin nodded and said thoughtfully: "War with Germany should be avoided...... However, it depends on Germany's ambitions for right-bank Ukraine. Comrade Molotov, what do you think? ”

"Comrade General Secretary, I think that the most important thing that the reactionaries in right-bank Ukraine want to see is that we go to war with Germany!" "Germany's position is very unclear at the moment, and if they stick to their original position of settling the eastern border on the basis of the Brest Treaty (unlike the Brest Treaty at this time, Germany did not occupy Ukraine), then the right-bank Ukraine problem could easily be resolved." ”

"Will that be a good thing?" Stalin looked at Molotov and said, "Comrade Molotov, you immediately go to Berlin and tell Hitler about our position." We call for the demarcation of the future border between the two countries on the basis of the Brest Treaty. (To be continued.) )