Chapter 973: The Soviet-German War Breaks Out (Subscribe Only!) , ask for a monthly pass, ask for everything! ）

The Germans had ceased their attack on the British, and although small-scale night air raids had continued since then, the large-scale air operations had ended. The unexpected actions of the Germans www.biquge.info the United States and the Soviet Union and other countries were constantly suspicious, and Germany intended to stop fighting or had other plans.

If the situation dies down, then it will be possible to start peace talks with Germany. If the Germans had other plans, then what were they going to do?

The Americans are okay, after all, the Germans are still far, far away from the American mainland, and even if Germany has any other actions, it will not be directed against the Americans. But the Soviets were not complacent, and throughout the war in Europe, Germany had now eliminated Poland, Denmark, Norway, France, Belgium, Portugal, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and annexed Czechoslovakia and Austria.

Italy and Spain, which was controlled by the rebels, were already open allies of Germany, and after the Soviet-Finnish war, Finland, which had lost 10% of its territory, had also taken refuge in Germany, and the Romanian government had also actively contacted the Germans.

The only countries that could be qualified to fight Germany were the Soviet Union and Britain, and the Germans were originally busy with the war in Western Europe, and the Soviet Union did not have a deep understanding of the threat to Germany.

But now that Germany has suddenly ceased its large-scale operations against Britain, it will only be possible to do so against the Soviet Union if Germany makes any more moves.

Although the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact was signed between the Soviet Union and Germany, neither Hitler nor Stalin took it too seriously, and anyone in their position knew that relations between states could never be maintained by a signed piece of paper.

If it is said that the non-aggression pact that Germany had to sign with the Soviet Union in order to attack Western Europe, then now that Germany has given up continuing to attack Britain, then it means that this non-aggression pact has lost its due role, and there is nothing wrong with the Germans tearing up the treaty.

In fact, in the later stages of the Battle of Britain, Hitler also saw that the Luftwaffe bombing effect was getting smaller and smaller, and the losses were getting bigger and bigger, and the hope of conquering Britain was slim, so he turned his attention to the East and stepped up preparations for an attack on the Soviet Union.

The "Sea Lion Project" was aborted, and the reason why it was delayed until 41 years before it completely stopped air raids against Britain was entirely to hide its ambition to attack the Soviet Union, and the "Sea Lion Project" actually became a strategic camouflage to cover up the German invasion of the Soviet Union.

The main thing is that the Germans have already figured out the details of the Soviet Red Army. Exactly as His Excellency the Führer had judged, the Soviet army was indeed weak.

After all, from the very beginning, Germany regarded the Soviet Union as an unprecedented enemy, and they had been secretly collecting military intelligence from the Soviet Union, and it was impossible for the Germans not to know about such a big political event as the Great Purge.

The Germans not only knew, but they knew it very well. The Germans even took advantage of Stalin's eagerness to consolidate power and his own authority to design the elimination of Tukhachevsky, the greatest field marshal since the founding of the Soviet Union.

Thinking of this, the corners of Hitler's mouth couldn't help but rise, this was the most successful espionage war he directed, successfully used Stalin's hand to remove the fierce rival Tukhachevsky and others, and even triggered Stalin's purge of the military system.

After the Soviet-Finnish war, the Germans thought that they had seen the reality of the Soviet Red Army, so they did not plan to disguise it, they wanted to act, and use German chariots to kill a space for the German people to live.

In the eyes of Hitler the mustache, when the Soviet Union was defeated, a large number of demobilized soldiers would be able to supplement the labor shortage in German industry, and Ukraine would be able to provide a large amount of cheap food. In addition, the occupation of the Soviet Union would have made it possible to have a large number of slave laborers, which would greatly improve Germany's geostrategic situation.

More importantly, defeating the Soviet Union would further isolate the British Empire.

Then there is oil, more of which is very much needed by the German war machine, and this can only be achieved after the capture of the Soviet Union's oil-producing area of Baku.

Hitler received the German plan for an invasion of the Soviet Union at the end of 1940 and approved it in full, with the expectation of commencement in March 1941. Hitler then signed the "Directive No. 21", asking the German High Command to prepare for a "quick defeat of the Soviet Union" and set a date for the invasion on March 15, 1941.

In preparation for the attack, Hitler sent 3.2 million men to the German-Soviet border, repeatedly sent reconnaissance planes to infiltrate Soviet airspace to investigate, and also stockpiled a large amount of military supplies on the Eastern Front. By February 1941, the Germans had 680,000 troops on the Romanian-Soviet border.

Even with such a huge process of preparation, the Soviet Union did not anticipate the intentions of the German army and was completely caught off guard when the war broke out. This was largely due to Stalin's conviction that the Third Reich could not attack less than two years after the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, and that Germany would wait until Britain to open a new battlefield.

Despite repeated warnings of impending war from Soviet intelligence, Stalin refused to change his mind, believing that this was a disinformation deliberately designed by Britain to bring the Soviet Union to war with Germany.

The German government also contributed to this deception, revealing to Stalin that the German troops were being moved only to get away from the range of the British bombers. Germany even explained to the Soviet Union that they were deliberately trying to make Britain think that they were preparing to attack the Soviet Union, when in fact they were preparing to attack Soviet troops and supplies. Therefore, until the outbreak of the war, Stalin was not seriously prepared for a possible invasion by German troops.

On March 15, 1941, Nazi Germany, in violation of the "Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact", dispatched 190 divisions, 3,700 tanks, 4,900 aircraft, 47,000 artillery pieces and 190 warships, a total of 5.5 million people, divided into three army groups, and launched a surprise attack on the Soviet Union in the form of blitzkrieg from the north, center, and south with a plan codenamed "Barbarossa" drawn up in advance, and the Soviet-German war broke out in an all-round way.

The Soviet-German war broke out very suddenly, and when the news came, the whole world was shaken.

You must know that the Soviet Union is still very cold in this season, and the best time to attack the Soviet Union should be from early May to June.

What was even more unexpected was that the performance of the mighty Soviet Union at the beginning of the war was really disappointing. In just 10 days, the Germans advanced 600 kilometers into the Soviet Union. On the first day of fighting, the Soviet Red Army lost 1,200 aircraft, 800 of which were blown up before they could take off.

In two weeks, the Soviet Red Army retreated 450 kilometers and abandoned the entire Baltic coastal area, 24 divisions of the Soviet Red Army were completely defeated, 20 divisions lost 60% of their personnel and equipment, and the German Army Group North soon reached the city of Leningrad.

The people of the three Baltic states, who had long been strongly dissatisfied with the rule of the Soviet Union, launched an insurrection against the Soviet regime at the time of the German invasion, which further contributed to the defeat of the Soviet Red Army.

The Central Front was the focus of the German assault, and the Central Army Group under the command of German Field Marshal Fedor von Bock attacked from the direction of the Grodno and Brest fortresses, and completed the encirclement of the Soviet Western Military District (i.e., the Western Front) through a double-pincer offensive, the Belarusian capital Minsk fell, the Soviet Red Army retreated 350 kilometers, 30 divisions were annihilated, and 70 divisions lost more than 50% of their personnel.

Subsequently, Army Group Center launched a second pincer offensive in the Smolensk region, and the Germans advanced slowly due to the effective organization of the defense by the Soviet Red Army. However, after two months of the battle, the German army still completed the encirclement and annihilated 300,000 Soviet Red Army.

In a short period of time, the Soviet Union became crumbling, and the whole world was shocked by the powerful front of the German army, including the United States and Britain.