Being Soviet: Identity, Rumour, and Everyday Life Under Stalin 1939-1953 (25 page)

54
Being Soviet

the glorious banners of the valiant Red Army.’
^{45
The Soviet press}
repeatedly reassured its readers, particular during the siege of Stalingrad, that the Soviet Union had become a beacon of hope for all humanity.
^{46
The Red Army was filling the void created by the allied failure to carry}
their share of the military burden. By late 1943 the image of the USSR had been transformed from a member of the progressive anti-Hitler alliance into its leader. The Soviet Union’s wartime allies were partners in the struggle with Germany, but they were also duly grateful for the overwhelming Soviet contribution to the war effort. The USSR was not just a Great Power, but the most active and heroic of the ‘Big Three’ states.

From Tehran to Normandy

The Soviet relationship with their Anglo-American Allies was irrevoca-
bly transformed by the Tehran Conference. From late 1943 onwards, the Second Front ceased to be the defining issue within the Alliance. The Council of Foreign Ministers, and the main conference itself, were held to discuss the ‘most speedy destruction of Hitler’s Germany and its allies in Europe’.
^{47
The three Great Powers left the meeting ‘true friends in}
spirit and action’.
^{48
It was a transparent code for the fact that the Allies}
had finally agreed to open the Second Front. The point was not lost on

the Soviet population, one of whom was quoted in
Pravda
saying, ‘The mutual understanding achieved here guarantees our victory.’
^{49
The new,}
more positive, tone was symbolized in Stalin’s observation in November 1943 that the ‘current activities of the allied armies in the South

of Europe [Italy] could not be regarded as a Second Front. But it is
something like a Second Front.’
^{50
The defining arena of distinction and}
definition within the Grand Alliance ceased to be an issue.

On 28 November 1943, the day the conference began,
Krasnaia Zvezda
published a cartoon entitled ‘Berlin Meeting’. It showed Ribbentrop and Goering meeting in the streets of Berlin because both of their ministries have been destroyed by bombing.
^{51
The Soviet press}

^{45
RGASPI f. 17, op. 125, d. 219, l. 93.}

^46
Ogon¨ek
, 11.1942: 44, pp. 8–9. Stalingrad:
Pravda
, 25.12.42, p. 4; 27, 12, 42, p. 4. See also:
Krasnaia Zvezda
, 03.02.1943, p. 4.

^47
Pravda
, 02.11.43, p. 1.
^48
Ogon¨ek
, 12.1943: 49, p. 1.

^49
Pravda
, 07.12.43, p. 2.
^50
Pravda
, 07.11.43, p. 1.

^{51
Krasnaia Zvezda}
, 28.11.1943, p. 4.

Perfidious Allies? 1941–45
55

even began to publish details about British battlefield losses for the first
time.
^{52
The eulogic tone took a dip in early 1944: allied military}
operations received just over a column per day between January and April. Stalin’s May Day statement, however, reasserted that relations were healthy within the allied camp. He stated that the Soviet successes ‘have been assisted to a significant degree by our great Allies, the USA and Great Britain . . . deflecting from us a significant part of the German army’.
^{53
A cartoon on 2 May depicted three guns, Soviet, American,}
and British blowing apart the fascist beast in his lair, and the fall of Rome was greeted as a ‘Great victory of the Allies’ with ‘great political and strategic significance’.
^{54
The imminence of the Second Front}
dissipated the uncertainty within the allied relationship after Tehran.

The removal of the Second Front as the defining source of tension
did not, however, precipitate a total reworking of Soviet identity within the Grand Alliance. The image of the USSR as the military driving force and moral leader of the anti-Hitler front remained at the centre of the official Soviet image of self after Tehran, and the Soviet press continued to belittle the efforts of the allied forces. This minimization is particu- larly notable in the context of the extremely positive reportage afforded to the USSR by the British and American press. Anglo-American film- makers, journalists, and academics rallied around the call to praise the Soviet Union and ‘Uncle Joe Stalin’ during World War II.
^55
Within
Official Soviet Identity, the distinctions between the Great Powers remained as important as the similarities. The centralization, valoriza- tion and glorification of the Red Army accelerated. In January 1944 Agitprop circulated a lecture, ‘About the military political and Interna- tional Situation’ to its propaganda groups. The first thirty-six pages of the report only mentioned the Allies to report on the German with- drawal from the Italian Front to transfer troops to the East. The three pages that did discuss the alliance focused on the weakness of the German military forces in Western Europe.
^56
As
Krasnaia Zvezda

^52
Pravda
, 23.03.44, p. 4. See also 15.03.44, p. 4, for civilian deaths from bombing.

^53
Pravda
, 01.05.44, p. 1.

^54
Pravda
, 02.05.44, p. 4. This kind of imagery was the focus of 11 of the 12
Pravda
wartime cartoons depicting the Allies: K. J. McKenna,
All the Views Fit to Print:
Changing Images of the U.S. in Pravda, Political Cartoons, 1917–1991 (New York, 2001), 54–6.
Pravda
, 05.06.44, p. 4.

^{55
See A. Perlmutter,}
FDR and Stalin: A Not So Grand Alliance, 1943–1945
(Columbia,

1993), 102–8, 157.

^{56
RGASPI f. 17, op. 125, d. 237, ll. 7–46.}

56
Being Soviet

explained in May 1944, the USSR was a ‘country of titans’ that enjoyed
‘the esteem and love of all the freedom loving peoples’.
^57
Ogon¨ek
’s front-page photograph of the Tehran conference subtly demonstrated this dynamic. Stalin sits, flanked by Roosevelt and Churchill, both of whom seem to be seated a couple of feet below him and so look up to the Soviet leader as he addresses the crowd (see Figure 2.1).
^58
This
image encapsulated the moral and military authority of the USSR that was further enhanced as the Red Army began its slow march to Berlin in the winter of 1943–4.
⁵⁹

After Tehran, the Soviet press also began to identify more clearly
those individuals within the allied states who were enemies of the USSR. Isolationist senators, such as Willer and Chandler, were the object of particular wrath.
^{60
Roosevelt’s withering attack on ‘cocktail hall dwell-}
ers’, who were using the war for social and political profit, was also reported.
^{61
In April 1944}
Krasnaia Zvezda
reported in quite negative terms about the ambitious expansion of the Rockerfeller oil ‘monopoly’,
Standard Oil
.
^62
Meanwhile
Pravda
took up cudgels against the
Daily Mail
and
New York Journal
that were dubbed the ‘audible echo of Goebbels’.
^{63
January 1944 also witnessed the revival of the assault on}
the Polish e
^{´
migre
´
government in London. The Soviet Union had}
severed its ties with the Sikorskii administration in the spring of 1943. The attack on the ‘pro-Hitler elements in the Polish Emigration’ returned to prominence in early 1944, and became a major internation- al news story for the rest of the war.
^{64
The image of the enemy, within}

the alliance camp, was much clearer after Tehran. Perhaps the greater
stability over the Second Front encouraged the Soviet government to take a more direct line against its overseas opponents. Nonetheless, the main focus of the Soviet press remained on the strength and collabora- tive nature of the anti-Hitler front.

^{57
Krasnaia Zvezda}
, 07.05.1944, p. 1.

^58
Ogon¨ek
, 12.1943: 49, p. 1.

^59
e.g.,
Pravda
, 03.02.44, p. 1.

^60
Pravda
, 28.11.43, p. 4; 03.01.44, p. 4.

^61
Pravda
, 13.01.44, p. 4.

^{62
Krasnaia Zvezda}
, 25.04.1944, p. 4.

^63
Pravda
, 03.03.43, p. 4; 25.02.44, p. 4.

^{64
It was the biggest international story in January (0.15 pages), March (0.10),}
October (0.18), and December (0.25) 1944.

Perfidious Allies? 1941–45
57

Fig. 2.1
Churchill and Roosevelt literally look up to Stalin

Ogon¨ek
, 12.1943: 49, p. 1.

From Normandy to Berlin

On 6 June 1944 the long awaited invasion of Europe arrived. The story
of the Anglo-American landings went out on successive news bulletins on the radio and was greeted in glowing terms on the morning of the 7th.
^65
Pravda
devoted two full pages to the story stating that ‘The blood flowing in the name of the common allied task in the East, West and the South strengthens the basis of the great military alliance of the freedom loving peoples.’
^{66
Il’ia Ehrenburg wrote excitedly in}
Krasnaia Zvezda
that ‘It has Begun!’ and expressed the pride of the Soviet people in their ‘brothers-in-arms’.
^{67
Over the following days, the strategic success of}
the amphibious landings was widely praised.
^{68
Stalin himself commen-}

^65
Werth,
Russia at War
, 853–4.

^66
Pravda
, 07.06.44, p. 3.