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Chapter 1833 is arrogant

During the period when An Yi left Xinjing for Guangzhou, held a Chinese wedding with Lin Shuangshu, and inspected the people's situation by the way, the world situation changed again. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

The outbreak of the Soviet-German war undoubtedly injected a shot in the arm for the British, who had suffered successive defeats in the Middle East and North Africa.

At that time, Churchill had returned to England from Washington, D.C., commanding the defensive operation against German air raids and remotely controlling the war in East Africa, and his command in the northern suburbs of London received news of Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union.

Thomson, the head of the Prime Minister's office, heard the news on the radio, and Churchill got the report and immediately ran to the radio to listen to it. Because it was a major news, the first round of broadcasts was completed, and the radio station replayed it again.

When Churchill had heard this, he nodded his head in satisfaction, and then hummed a little tune happily, as if he were dancing with his hands.

For Churchill, there was nothing happier than the outbreak of the Soviet-German war.

Churchill was a veteran of the anti-Soviet Union, and after the victory of the October Revolution and the establishment of Soviet power in Russia by Lenin, the contradictions between Britain and the Soviet Union quickly sharpened.

In 1918, Churchill gave a speech in the parliamentary elections, calling the Bolsheviks "brutal gorillas" who "would soon drag Russia back to the barbaric period of animal form." It was also said that "the essence of Bolshevik theory is a regression to the Middle Ages." Therefore, "after defeating the tiger of the world, the Germans, we can no longer be allowed to strangle us by gorillas." He also made a special submission to the British Cabinet of Ministers proposing to "draw up a roster of members of the Bolshevik government" so that those men could be punished at all costs in the future.

In Churchill's eyes, Hitler was the devil, and Stalin was the devil. He had already come up with a good idea for the devil to fight the devil. In 1919, Churchill, then Secretary of State for the Army and Secretary of State for the Air Force, expressed his complaint to Lloyd's Churchill. Prime Minister George said: "The policy towards Soviet Russia should be very simple. Raise Germany and force him to fight against the Bolsheviks. ”

At that time, Churchill had a principle in dealing with Germany and Soviet Russia, which was called "destroy the Bolsheviks and kiss the Germans." "He did what he said and personally participated in the armed intervention against Russia.

As a result, Churchill's dream of kissing a German guy did not come true. As soon as Hitler came to power, he raised the stick of revenge and, as soon as his feathers were full, pounced on Britain and France. At this time, Churchill knew that the most dangerous enemy at present was Hitler. Therefore, under the current situation of ineffective war against Germany, Churchill began to adopt a foreign policy of uniting with the United States and winning over the Soviet Union, and did not hesitate to send a secret blow to Stalin.

In his view, this kind of autumn wave is very necessary, and it is very much in line with his strategic thinking of "bringing disaster to the east" and is also in line with his good idea of "the devil fighting the devil." The sandpiper and the clam compete, and the fisherman gains, so why not?

The day after the Barbarossa Plan began, Churchill addressed the House of Commons.

"There has not been a single person who has been so consistently opposed to Bolshevism in the last twenty-five years as I have been, and I do not wish to retract what I have said. But all of this, compared to the scene that is unfolding before our eyes, has been overshadowed. Everything that has passed, with its sins, its stupidity, its tragedies, has passed in a flash.

"I saw Russian soldiers standing on the borders of the Motherland, defending the land that their ancestors had cultivated since ancient times, I saw brutal German soldiers rushing at them like a pack of hungry wolves, and behind these German soldiers, there was a handful of villains who planned and organized this great terror that threatened humanity. We, the British Empire, have only one aim, and that is determined to destroy all traces of Hitler and the Nazi system, and we want to give Russia and the Russians all possible assistance.

"Hitler's attack on Russia was only a prelude to an attempt to attack the British Isles. He undoubtedly hoped that all this would be done before the onset of winter, that the defeat of the Soviet Union would be followed by the defeat of the powerful Allied forces of the United States and Britain, and that he would repeat the old tactics he had broken one by one with an attack on a larger scale than before.

"Therefore, the crisis of Russia is our crisis, and the danger of the United States and the rest of the world, just as the cause of the Russians fighting for the defense of their homeland is the cause of free people and free peoples all over the world. Let's redouble our efforts, and as long as there is a breath and strength, let's work together to fight the enemy! ”

Look at the United States again.

Before the outbreak of the Soviet-German war, although the Roosevelt administration frequently sent people to contact Moscow, the mainstream media in the United States still criticized the Soviet Union as an accomplice of the Nazis. In fact, diplomatic relations between the United States and the Soviet Union were not opened for the first time until seven years ago after the October Revolution in Russia, but there are still many diplomatic conflicts, and relations between the two countries are extremely cold.

The Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact of '38, as well as the Soviet attack on Finland from October to March last year, and the subsequent annexation of the three Baltic states, greatly disillusioned the Soviet Union in the United States. In addition, there was the Comintern of the Soviet Union, which instigated the trade unions to organize strikes at the time of the general industrial mobilization of the United States, and the anti-war propaganda in the Comintern press, which led to the gradual distancing of Americans from Russia, except for the few liberals who were most sympathetic to the Soviet Union.

But the Soviet-German war changed all that.

On 25 June, three days after the outbreak of the Soviet-German war, following Churchill's remarks on aid to the Soviet Union the day before, US Deputy Secretary of State Sumner Murphy Bush. Wells also openly stated that "any force is welcome to oppose Hitlerism, regardless of where it comes from." Subsequently, Soviet assets in the United States that had been frozen during the Finnish War were unfrozen, and within the first two weeks of the Soviet-German war, small shipments began to be loaded from the United States to the Soviet Union.

On 1 July, after receiving a positive reply from US envoy Hopkins, who had been urgently dispatched to the Soviet Union to coordinate the war against Germany, Roosevelt ordered: "Immediately send a large amount of aid to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics." However, even if he had the most resolute will in the world, it would not be possible to produce a large amount of weapons and equipment overnight, after all, the US military itself now lacks sufficient weapons and equipment, so it can only send a small part of what was originally assigned to Britain to the Soviet Union to support the Soviet Union's war.

The Soviet Union purchased goods in the United States, initially in cash, but as the situation on the battlefield deteriorated dramatically, the Soviet ambassador to the United States began to negotiate some form of credit with the United States.

In a letter to Stalin in late July, Roosevelt wrote: "In order to eliminate financial difficulties, arrangements will be made immediately for military supplies worth a billion dollars to be dealt with under the Lend-Lease Act." If the Soviet Government agrees, I propose that the debt should be made without interest, and that the Soviet Government should begin to pay the arrears five years after the end of the war and pay it off in full within the next ten years. ”

Stalin agreed to Roosevelt's proposal. Subsequently, after negotiations with diplomats, Roosevelt declared in a statement issued on 15 August that "the defense of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is of the utmost importance to the defense of the United States," and ordered the Lend-Lease Governor, Edward Edward. Stettinus "transferred defensive munitions to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in accordance with Lend-Lease."

By this time, relations between the Soviet Union and the United States and Britain were on the right track. However, both the United States and Britain were worried that the Soviet Union would not be able to resist the attack of the powerful German army, and the aid provided at this time was still very small, and the delivery task could be completed only by arriving at Murmansk on the Kola Peninsula in the north of the Soviet Union through the Arctic Ocean route.

On the Soviet side.

In order to cope with the German offensive, Stalin announced the establishment of the National Defense Committee on 3 July, which would concentrate all the leadership powers, and the decision to start peace talks with the Soviet Republics in the Far East was also made after discussions. The first members of the council were Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov, Malenkov and Beria, and later Lyuschenkov and Yegorov were added in order to allow the two million Far Eastern Army to fight without reservation.

On the day of the establishment of the National Defense Committee, Stalin made a radio speech in which he issued an urgent mobilization to the Soviet military and civilians, proposing a strategic plan for the complete defeat of the German fascist aggressors.

In his speech, Stalin pointed out that the German fascist attack on the Soviet Union was a question of "the life and death of the Soviet state, the life and death of the people of all nationalities in the Soviet Union, and the question of whether the people of all nationalities in the Soviet Union enjoyed freedom or were reduced to slavery." He called on the Soviet people to take urgent action to bravely defend the motherland together with the Red Army, to defend every inch of Soviet territory, and to fight to the last drop of blood for the defense of the cities and villages of the Soviet Union.

Stalin said that the current war between the Soviet Union and the German fascists is not only a war between the two fascists, but also a great war of the people of the entire Soviet Union against the German fascist army. The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet people will be fused with the struggle of the peoples of Europe and the United States for independence, democracy and freedom to form an anti-fascist united front.

On 10 July, the Soviet High Command was reorganized into the Supreme High Command, with Stalin as its chairman, and since the Far Eastern Republic had already expressed its will for peace, in order to stabilize the rear, Stalin gave the Far Eastern Republic two seats, so in addition to the historical Molotov, Timoshenko, Budyonny, Voroshilov, Shaposhnikov, and Zhukov, Yegorov and Lyuschenkov were also included, nine members. Stalin became the supreme commander-in-chief of the USSR both as chairman of the State Defense Committee and as chairman of the Supreme High Command.

At a time when diplomatic and political activities were frequent, the Soviet-German war, which was on a grand scale, was also raging, and the war was becoming more and more intense.

At the beginning of the war, Hitler, with an unprecedented force of 6 million, formed four fists, which were rapidly attacked the Soviet Union from four directions: northern, central, southern, and Asian. From north to south, Leningrad, Moscow, Kiev, Baku, are under unprecedented pressure.

The Soviet Union was ill-prepared, rushed to the battle, and suffered many defeats.

The mechanized troops of Germany, advancing almost at a rate of fifty kilometers per day. After Stalin gave the order to resolutely resist, the Soviet Red Army quickly adjusted its forces and fought tenaciously against the fiercely attacking German army. At this time, it was not a few divisions, several corps, or a few corps that were engaged in the battle at the same time on both sides of the battle every day, but dozens of divisions, dozens of corps, and several group army groups.

These heavy soldiers,-for-tat with each other, do not give in to each other, fight together, tear together, their momentum is like a frenzy surging, thousands of horses galloping, thunder and thunder. The heavy troops of the two sides fought hard at the place of contact, and the result was that corpses were strewn all over the field and rivers of blood flowed. Wherever the war went, the smoke and fire were raging, and they were immediately reduced to ruins.

On the battle line, the two sides wedged each other, broke through each other, and expanded and contracted each other, forming a staggered trend. However, neither side had the slightest intention of backing down. One army group was defeated, and another army group or armies swarmed up. This is an unprecedented battle for strength and perseverance.

All the way to the north, German Field Marshal Ritter. Feng. Loeb's operational group, with Heppner's 4th Panzer Corps as the center, Küsilel's 18th Army as the left flank, and Boucher's 16th Army as the right flank, with the support of the 1st Air Force, carried out an offensive from Königsberg in East Prussia in the general direction of Daugavpils-Puskov-Leningrad.

Loeb's initial mission to the 4th Panzer Corps was to capture the two bridges over the Western Dvina River outside Daugavpils in their entirety and capture Daugavpils.

To this end, Manstein's 56th Panzer Corps and Reinhardt's 41st Panzer Corps launched a march race. Manstein led the 56th Panzer Corps to flank off the left and right flanks, and single-handedly rushed 320 kilometers in four days, and his 8th Panzer Division was the first to reach the outside of Daugavpils on 27 June.

The commander of the division, Brandenburg, asked the German soldiers to use the captured four Soviet cars, disguised as the retreating Soviet wounded soldiers, deceived the Soviet troops guarding the bridge, and completely captured the two bridges over the West Dvina, so that the main force of Army Group North successfully crossed the wide West Dvina River and captured the city of Daugavpils.

The loss of Daugavpils completely exposed the Pskov-Leningrad line to the German army due to the loss of its natural barrier.

Stalin could no longer contain his anger and ordered the dismissal of Colonel-General Kuznetsov from the post of commander of the North-Western Front, his replacement by the commander of the Eighth Army, Major General Sobinnikov, and the appointment of Lieutenant General Vatutin as chief of staff of the Front. However, the new command structure of the Soviet army was still unable to turn the tide of the war, and the German army continued to rush towards the Soviet army like a tidal wave, and the Soviet army, which was in a passive position, not only did not have the strength to fight back, but also did not even have the ability to parry.

On 2 July, the Germans occupied Riga, the capital of Latvia.

On 5 July, the Germans broke through the Soviet line of defense from Latvia to the Russian border, and then on 10 July occupied Pskov, which was abandoned by the Soviets, opening the door to Leningrad. At the end of June, the two armies of the Finnish Army, Southeastern and Karelia on the Finnish side north of Leningrad, launched a fierce attack on the Soviet Northern Front in the direction of Petrozavodsk and Vyborg, respectively, and Leningrad was caught between the German and Finnish armies in the north and south.

Marshal Voroshilov, who was ordered at the moment of danger, urgently mobilized millions of Leningrad residents to build three lines of defense around Leningrad day and night, the outermost of which was centered on the city of Luga, starting from Shimsk on the west bank of Lake Ilmen in the south, along the Luga River, and reaching the mouth of the Luga River in the north, Jinjishep, with a total length of about 300 kilometers, and deployed four infantry divisions and three militia divisions on this defense line. Considering the relatively weak combat effectiveness of the Finnish army in the northern direction, Voroshilov transferred six divisions and one brigade from the Northern Front to strengthen the defense of the Luga line.

After the capture of Pskov by the German Army Group North, its main forces, led by Reinhardt's 41st Panzer Army, continued to attack along the Luga-Leningrad axis; Manstein's 56th Panzer Corps made a detour to the east and attacked Chudovo in an attempt to cut off Leningrad from Moscow.

The Soviets put up desperate resistance on the Luga Line and launched a powerful attack on the flank of Manstein's 56th Panzer Corps, which was alone to the east, driving it back.

Army Group North was blocked on the banks of the Luga River, bankrupting Hitler's plan to take Leningrad by 21 July.

On 19 July, Hitler issued Order No. 33, ordering the 3rd Panzer Corps of Hult of Army Group Center to move north, cut off the line of communication between Leningrad and Moscow, and assist Army Group North in attacking Leningrad.

On 21 July, Hitler arrived in Pskov by special train, summoned Loeb, commander of Army Group North, and ordered him to take Leningrad as soon as possible at all costs.

In conclusion, Hitler said: "As for the aftermath of Petersburg, we must not be merciful, and make every Russian tremble!" We have to trample under the meaningless laws of the old world, the Jewish and religious traditions of the old world. We don't need Russia, we don't need either hostile Russia or friendly Russia, we just need a land of the East. Therefore, we will never accept the surrender of either Petersburg or Moscow, you must make them come to naught, turn them into dust, and let them disappear from the face of the earth. ”

As a result, Loeb readjusted the deployment of troops:

The Northern Assault Group, with Reinhardt's 41st Panzer Army and Qusiler's 18th Army, broke through the defensive line from the lower reaches of the Luga River and attacked Leningrad via Ghatt; The 56th Panzer Corps of Manstein formed the Western Assault Group, attacked Luga from the middle reaches of the Luga River, pinned down the main Soviet army, and then attacked Leningrad along the Luga-Leningrad road; The Southern Assault Group, formed by Boucher's 16th Army and the 57th Panzer Corps of the 3rd Panzer Corps of Hote in Army Group Center, broke through the defensive line from the upper reaches of the Luga River, then turned northeastward, attacked Chudovo, cut off the October railway line from Leningrad to Moscow, and surrounded Leningrad from the east.

On 8 August, the German army from the north of the Luga River took the lead in launching a fierce assault on the Gingisep area, and by 13 August, it broke through the Gingisepp defense line, occupied the Moroskovice station, and cut off the railway and road lines from Leningrad to Gingisepp; On 11 August, the South Army launched an offensive from the upper reaches of the Luga River to the Simsk region, and by 15 August it broke through the first line of defense of the Soviet army, occupied Novgorod, and then advanced to Chudovo in the northeast, and prepared to cross the Volkhov River with part of its forces and occupy Tikhvin; The 56th Panzer Corps of Manstein launched an attack on Luga on 10 August, and although it was defeated, it pinned down the strength of three Soviet divisions.

On 15 August, Manstein was ordered to hand over the task to the 50th Army and lead the 56th Panzer Corps south to support the German army in the south. At the same time, the Finnish South-Eastern Army north of Leningrad also advanced towards Lake Ladoga with the strength of three divisions, and the Finnish Karelian Army launched an offensive against the Soviet 23rd Army on the Karelian Isthmus.

At present, the situation in Leningrad is already in danger, and if Voroshilov does not come up with appropriate countermeasures, the fall of Leningrad will be inevitable.

All the way to the south, Field Marshal Gerd. Feng. The operational group, led by Field Marshal Rundstedt, marched towards the Dnieper and Kiev, but the Germans met stubbornly with stubborn resistance from the Southwestern Front of the Soviet Red Army on this front.

In accordance with Stalin's orders, the Soviet Southwestern Front began to retreat from the western Ukrainian region on 1 July, and the task was to occupy the fortified areas of Korosjian, Volynsky New Town, Shepetovka, Staraya Konstantinov, and Proskurov built on the old state border with field troops by July 10, and to organize a strong defense on this front.

The purpose of the basic forces of the German Army Group South, which was scheduled to operate in the direction of Kiev, was to break through the front of the Soviet army on the front line of the old fortified area, advance to the Kiev area, seize the landing ground on the Dnieper, and then turn to the southeast to attack in order to prevent the main forces of the Southwestern Front from retreating to the other side of the Dnieper and destroy it by surprise attack from the rear.

Forty-four divisions of the South-Western Front, which had been severely weakened in battle, confronted forty divisions of the Germans. The Germans had more than twice as many infantry, artillery and mortars and fifty percent more aircraft than the Soviets.

On 6 July, the Germans began their offensive, arriving in the main assault direction before the Front had completed its retreat and had begun its line of fortified areas. On July 7, the Germans, with the tank corps as the first echelon, broke through the Soviet defenses north of Novomiropol and captured Berdichev in the evening. Next. A breakthrough was made south of Volynsky City, and on July 9, Zhytomyr was captured.

On 11 July, the advance force of the 1st German tank group advanced 110 kilometers in two days and nights to the Irpian River, 15 to 20 kilometers west of Kiev. Here, tanks and motorized infantry were held back by the Soviets in the outer encirclement of the fortified area of Kyiv. The attempt of the Germans to seize Kiev from the march was broken.

At this time, Marshal Zhukov, who commanded the Southwestern Front, suggested that Stalin decisively abandon Kiev and withdraw the Southwestern Front to the other side of the Dnieper River to avoid being surrounded by the German army, and then defend Moscow with all his might, but Stalin categorically refused, and Zhukov, who "preached defeatism", was immediately relieved of his post as commander of the Southwestern Front and served as the commander of the reserve front, and was once again marginalized.

The new commander of the Soviet Southwestern Front, Marshal Budyonny, resolutely carried out Stalin's strategic intentions and launched counter-assaults in Kiev on several occasions, causing the offensive on the left flank of the German Army Group South to be delayed for a long time, forcing the German High Command to consider transferring a large part of Army Group "Center" -- the Second Army and the Second Tank Group -- from the direction of Moscow to deal with the Southwestern Front.

The predetermined plans of the Germans were:

The second group of tanks crossed the Desna River from west of Tubitzivsk and advanced southward, straight into Romne, behind Kiev; The 2nd Army moved south from Gomel to cover the right flank of the 2nd tank group; The 1st Tank Group attacked north from Kremenchuk on the Dnieper Bend, joined up with the 2nd Tank Group in the area of Romne and Lokhvica, and cut off the Soviet troops on the west bank of the Dnieper River in the area of the Great River Meander; The 17th Army was responsible for pinning down the Soviet troops in the Dnieper bend north of Cherkasy, while covering the left flank of the 1st tank group; The Sixth Army went east, crossed the Dnieper, entered Kiev, and began to encircle and annihilate this group of Soviet heavy troops.

On 21 July, Hitler officially ordered to intensify the offensive on the northern and southern flanks of the Soviet-German battlefield and to make a far-reaching detour of the front along the east bank of the Dnieper River from the north and south. The German High Command intended to divide the Soviet Southwestern Front into several relatively isolated strategic groupings through a far-flung frontal assault and subsequent flank assault.

When the German army was deploying troops, the Soviet army was still actively organizing assaults to crush the German offensive.

From 19 to 29 July, the Soviet 26th Army attempted to disrupt the encirclement maneuver of the 1st German tank group, but it was only held back for a few days, and then forced to retreat under the German assault.

On 3 August, the Germans attacked the Uman area on two flanks, encircling the Soviet Sixth Army and the Twelfth Army.

On 8 August, the "Uman Pocket" was eliminated, and the Germans captured more than 103,000 Soviet troops, including Lieutenant General Muzychenko, commander of the Sixth Army, and Major General Ponegerin, commander of the 12th Army.

The Soviet 37th Army successfully repelled a powerful assault from the southwest by the German heavy group in the first half of August to capture the Ukrainian capital. The Germans broke through to the suburbs of Kiev, Juliane, and Meshelovka. However, the counter-assault carried out by the Soviets made it possible to restore the front along the outer perimeter of the fortified area almost completely by 15 August. The citizens of Kiev and nearby residents formed the City Defense Command in accordance with the decisions of the Ubud Central Committee, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of Ukraine and the Council of People's Commissars of Ukraine. In a short period of time, two hundred thousand Kievans were forced to join the city defense forces.

As far as the overall strategic situation is concerned, the German army is about to complete the encirclement of Kiev, and the Soviet army is already in an extremely unfavorable situation. During this period, Zhukov repeatedly proposed to Stalin to withdraw his troops from Kiev, but they were refused.

Transcaucasian direction, Vilna. Feng. The Turkish cluster led by Marshal Bloomberg fought without danger and everything went well. Since most of the main forces of the Soviet army were in the Persian border areas at the beginning, they were preparing to take the opportunity to pick up the leaks after the German invasion of Persia and Iraq. As a result, the direction of the German offensive was the Transcaucasian region of the Soviet Union, which led to the fact that the Soviet troops could not complete the build-up of forces in time, which were broken by the Germans one by one.

By 6 August, the Germans had successfully captured the city of Baku, the most important oil and gas center in the Soviet Union. Since Turkey is connected to Baku by railway, Germany will have access to a steady stream of oil from Baku's oil fields through the Eurasian Railway, which is much more convenient and affordable than the Libyan and Egyptian oil fields, which also need to build railways to get oil.

Hitler was overjoyed and ordered Werner to be commended. Feng. Field Marshal Bloomberg, at present, the German Turkish cluster is taking a short break, and then it will move north along the Black Sea and Caspian coasts, attacking the lower reaches of the Don River, the North Caucasus, and the Crimea, in response to the attack of the southern cluster.

Compared with the above three theaters, the situation is the most complicated on the Western Front.

After the defeat in the Battle of Minsk, Yegorov led more than 100,000 troops who broke through the encirclement and retreated to the Smolensk region, and on July 11, the Germans launched an offensive from the Polotsk, Vitebsk, and Rogachev lines, with the main forces of the 3rd and 2nd Panzer Groups to carry out a pincer assault in the direction of Smolensk, and with part of their forces to carry out auxiliary assaults in the direction of Velikiye Luki and Roslavl, followed by the 9th and 2nd armies.

On the 14th, the Soviet army, under the command of Yegorov, carried out a counter-assault on the German army and recaptured the cities of Rogaschev and Zhilobin. On the 16th, the German army, with the support of aviation firepower, captured Smolensk and Orsha, occupied Yelnya on the 20th, and on the 23rd to the 25th, the Soviet army carried out a centripetal assault on the Smolensk area with four army-level battle clusters, and the main forces of the 20th and 16th armies took advantage of the situation to break through.

On the 26th, the Germans closed the Smolensk encirclement from the east.

The next day, the Soviet Mogilev group was annihilated.

On the 30th, the Soviet troops formed a reserve front in the rear of the Western Front to cover the Moscow direction. On the same day, the Germans were ordered to move to the defense and rest and replenish.

From 5 to 8 August, the Soviet Smolensk group and the Roslavl group were annihilated one after another. On the 9th, the Germans turned south to eliminate the threat from the right flank.

With the German forces in front of him drastically reduced, Yegorov was preparing a wave of counterattacks to break the German defensive line in the Smolensk region and retake Smolensk and Minsk, the capital of Belarus to the east.

The Soviet-German battlefield was full of success, and for Hitler and senior German officials at this time, every day was full of hope and passion.

The optimism of the German General Staff, for example, can be reflected in the boasting of Halder's diary on the Fourth of July: "It is probably not an exaggeration to insist that the Russian campaign has been won within two weeks. Of course, this is not to say that the campaign is over. ”

Helmut, who was in charge of keeping a military diary in Yorel. In a letter dated July 10, Greiner revealed that the High Command also believed that the campaign was much smoother than expected. "We occupied the Dvinsk and Minsk regions, so that I had completed a third of the journey to Leningrad and Moscow in just one week; At this rate, in fourteen days we will be in these two cities; However, it may be faster than we think."

Hitler even agreed. At the Chancellery in Berlin, Hitler gazed at a map on the wall of the dining room and declared in a voice that his secretaries could hear: "In a few weeks, we will enter Moscow, and then I will raze it to the ground, build a reservoir there, and the name Moscow must be erased." ”

A few days later, Ribbentrop addressed his senior diplomat in the same language: "In six or eight weeks, the Russian campaign will be over, and the war against Britain may continue for another six or ten years." ”

Around the same time, Hitler made an effort to get his ambassador von Hitler. Morality. Schulenburg (whom Hitler always regarded as a pro-Soviet man, and who had used his strengths to send ambassador to Moscow, who had been repatriated from Moscow) believed: "By the middle of August we will enter Moscow." By October 1, the Russian war will end. ”

In July and August, Hitler had every reason to think that he would be victorious, given that the German advantage in the early stages of the war was too great.

German intelligence quoted Stalin and Molotov as secretly revealing to foreign diplomats that the Soviets had admitted to crossing Leningrad, Minsk, Kiev and even Moscow off the defense map, although this was only a prediction.

The intelligence services also sent Hitler a report from the U.S. Embassy in Moscow to his government on Soviet morale, describing Moscow's dire air raid preparedness alerts, and worrying about food and rumors that the Russian people had moved their stored gold and silver to safety.

Joyful Hitler, having lunch with Ribbentrop one day in mid-July, had already expanded his plan to turn Russia into a colony, and contrasted the pure populism of the Bolsheviks with the basic order of the fascist revolution. "If there is no compulsion, people will always have to go back to live like rabbits", and the Russian peasants did not work willingly. This is why their slogans and practices failed, and they had to adopt a collective system - replacing the landlords with political commissars. Actually, it's all the same thing. The Slavs do not know, they can only be managed. They need to be enslaved.

Sometime in late July, in the midst of successive victories in the front, Hitler thought that the Russian campaign seemed to be nearing its end, and explained to a pre-selected audience at lunch why he attacked Russia without formally declaring war or even using a certain "event" as an excuse:

"In the courts of history, a person's motives have never been asked, but the facts have always been judged. Tell me, who asked why Alexander invaded India? Why did the Romans fight their Punic Wars? Why did Frederick II fight his Second Battle of Silesia? The law in history is that the victor is the prince and the loser is the thief. I, Hitler, am responsible only to my people.

"Sacrificing the lives of thousands of soldiers for the sake of the question of the theoretical motive for waging war is not only pedantic, it should be said to be a crime. I will go down in history as the exterminator of Bolshevism, whether it has a border incident or not, and only the final outcome has the right to judge. If I lose, then it is illogical for me to say anything. Look at France, we would never have succeeded if I had announced my plan of battle first, but it was of great importance to the fate of Germany. On the other hand: if Churchill and Renault had been silent, I probably wouldn't have attacked France either. ”

In short, Hitler was so enchanted by the victory that he turned his mind to the longer and farther battles ahead, and the day after his victory at Minsk, Hitler instructed Brauchitsch not to send any new tank units to the Eastern Front, and that the Panzer Divisions there were to be reduced. Tank crews who had nothing to do were to be sent back to Germany to train new tank divisions. The next day, in an order from the Supreme High Command, he further affirmed this: In addition to the 20 existing armored divisions, by 1 May next year the Army will establish 16 more armored divisions - 12 for the East and 24 for other tasks.

One day in early August, Hitler ruled that after the defeat of the Soviet Union, the main forces would be transferred to the Western Front and to Asia, where future wars would most likely break out! In addition, naval construction will be limited and will be able to meet the needs of war with Britain and the United States. However, the Air Force will be massively expanded, and by next spring, the factories of the Air Force will be working at maximum efficiency, and Germany will have more Air Force to participate in the operation.

One night in mid-August, Hitler said in a casual conversation with a senior member of the Nazi Party: "I dare say that the end of this war is the beginning of a long friendship with Britain." But if we are to live peacefully with her, then we must first defeat her! ”

The arrogance of Hitler and his deployment was on full display in this series of remarks, and the spearhead even began to be aimed at South China.

Is it really that simple, though?

~~~~~~~~~~~

: Well, let's focus on the current relations between the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union, as well as the current situation on the Soviet-German battlefield. Due to the involvement of An Yi and South China, time and space were different, and the situation in the Soviet Union was much worse than in history. The officers and men of the Far Eastern Republic had to go to the war at least in September or October.

Many people now imagine Nazi Germany as beautiful, but in fact ignore the cruelty of Nazism itself, that is, the complete plundering of the living space of other races and the extermination of all so-called inferior races. The fact that the people of Ukraine, eastern Poland, Belarus and the three Baltic states, from actively supporting the German invasion at the beginning to eventually coming to the opposite side of Germany, is not unrelated to the genocidal policy implemented by Nazi Germany.

Finally, let's advertise: I am confident that if I live for 200 years, I will hit the water for 3,000 miles! Regan's new work "Borderless Officialdom", the picture scroll of the era of reform and opening up is slowly unfolding, please read it! ***.***.***/book/