The 900 Days (15 page)

¹⁵
Dr. Gebhardt von Walther, now German Ambassador to Moscow and then a secretary in the German Embassy, regards it as inconceivable that Stalin could have supposed the attack to have been made by Nazi generals, acting without Hitler’s orders. He regards it as equally impossible that the Russians should have made an effort to contact Berlin through the Japanese. At the same time he feels certain Stalin believed until the last that Hitler was trying to blackmail him and that war could be averted. (Walther, personal conversation, June 16, 1967.)

¹⁶
The question of Stalin’s leadership and the precise assessment of responsibility for the terrible failures of policy and intelligence in the months before the Nazi attack is one of the most sensitive topics in Soviet historiography—so sensitive as to reveal clearly the role Stalin and his conduct still play in Kremlin politics. For example, Maisky spoke freely of his doubts about Stalin and his alienation from Stalin’s policies in the version of his memoirs published in
NovyMir
(No. 12, December, 1964). But when the book version of the memoirs appeared six months later, Maisky’s expressions of doubt regarding Stalin’s leadership had vanished. And Maisky’s description of Stalin’s difficult, labored broadcast of July 3, 1941, was sharply censored. (I. M. Maisky,
Vospominaniya Sovet-skogo Posla
, Moscow, 1965, pp. 140-147.) Also compare Admiral N. G. Kuznetsov’s account of 1965 and that of 1968, in which Stalin’s collapse vanishes!
(Oktyabr
, No. 11, November, 1965, and
Oktyabr
, No. 8, August, 1968.)

Even more striking is the controversy over the work of one of the ablest Soviet historians, A. M. Nekrich. Nekrich published in 1966 an intensive study of the pre-June 22, 1941, events, called
1941, 22 lyunya
. Nekrich presents an account of the warnings, intelligence reports and growing concerns of the front commanders over the mounting evidence that Hitler was preparing to attack. He concludes that Stalin consistently discounted this evidence and continued to assume that no attack was likely before autumn 1941 or spring 1942. Nekrich’s work was reviewed favorably in
Novy Mir
(No. 1, January, 1966, p. 260), which called it “clear, intelligent and interesting” and highly recommended the book to the general public. Nekrich’s work was published under the auspices of the Marxism-Leninism Institute, the highest Marxist scholarly institution in the country. It was translated in other Eastern European countries, where it was reviewed in glowing terms. Then, after an acrimonious discussion under the auspices of the Institute of History in Moscow, Nekrich was expelled from the Communist Party in June, 1967, and his work was severely censured. It was plain that twenty-five years after the events the moves and countermoves of the period 1940–41 still possessed major significance in Soviet contemporary politics.

EARLY SUNDAY MORNING, JUNE 22, FYODOR TROFIMOV, A veteran Leningrad Harbor pilot, rose to carry out a routine assignment. He was to pilot the Estonian passenger-freight steamer
Ruhno
out of Leningrad Harbor. The
Ruhno
was sailing that morning for Tallinn. Trofimov emerged from the bunkhouse of the pilot station to find the sun not yet as high as the tall banks of the nearby Leningrad grain elevators. There was only a breath of wind off the gulf, but the air was clean and smelled of the morning. In the quiet harbor oil slicks lay on the water without a ripple.

A launch was waiting for Trofimov. He shook hands with the boatman and directed him to Pier 21, where the
Ruhno
waited. There were few ships in the Barochny anchorage. They passed the northern breakwater and then slowed to permit a big excursion boat to enter the Sea Canal. Early though it was, a band was playing on the boat’s deck and pretty girls waved and shouted. Trofimov lifted his cap and waved back. The launch passed under the bow of a high Danish refrigerator ship, and ahead loomed the
Ruhno
, its name neatly painted in white letters; below that, in gold, was lettered its home port, Tallinn. The
Ruhno
was a beautiful small ship, more like a yacht than a commercial vessel. It was rich with mahogany and bright with gleaming white work. It was on the regular Tallinn-Leningrad passenger run.

Trofimov boarded the
Ruhno
, introduced himself to the young captain and soon headed the ship into the Gutuyevsky basin. The sun was rising over the city now, burnishing the cupolas with gold. High above gleamed the great dome of St. Isaac’s and the needle spire of the Admiralty.

Hundreds of times Trofimov had taken the familiar route from the port to the lee of Kronstadt, where he would be dropped and the
Ruhno
would head into the open gulf. His task was to guide the ship into the Sea Canal which traversed the shallow Neva estuary, a distance of fifteen miles, taking the ship out the invisible sea gates of Leningrad and setting it on course. As the
Ruhno
entered the Neva inlet, an overladen barge with sand from the London banks in the Gulf of Finland appeared. Trofimov had to slow the
Rukhno
to keep from swamping the barge. He shouted a curse at the barge captain, then picked up speed.

The harbor was unusually beautiful on this Sunday morning. Dozens of white sailboats dotted the horizon. As the sun rose higher, it grew warmer. The green forests of Strelna came into view and the
Ruhno
passed the first Sergyevsky buoy. No ships appeared. Trofimov loosened his collar. He was beginning to feel drowsy and he cushioned his chin in his hand. As he did so, he smelled the meerschaum and resin imbedded in his palm. He was about to tell the
Ruhno’s
captain how he loved the smells of the sea when the world exploded before his eyes. He lost consciousness. Gradually, he regained his senses to find himself covered with blood. His head hurt. What had happened he could not guess.
¹
The sun still shone brightly and the green woods of Strelna lay off to the north. From somewhere in the distance he heard the shout: “All hands abandon ship!” There was a roar of escaping steam. The ship was beginning to sink. Suddenly Trofimov noted the position. The center of the channel! Should the
Ruhno
sink there, Leningrad’s port would be completely blocked. He pulled himself up to the bridge. If only the steering chain still worked. He yanked it. At first no result. Then, as he watched, the nose of the ship swung slowly and the
Ruhno
headed for the channel side. Slowly, slowly the ship inched forward. Slowly, it lost speed. Slowly, it sank lower. A moment before it went under, Trofimov leaped. He was pulled into a lifeboat as the
Ruhno
nosed down on the very edge of the canal.

The hour was still well before noon, and the sun stood high in a blue and cloudless sky.

Summer had hardly begun when Ilya Glazunov went with his mother, as they did each year, from the big apartment in the gloomy Petrograd Quarter to their country cottage, a few miles beyond Detskoye Selo, in the forest south of Leningrad. The little boy loved the Russian countryside. Here he had drawn his first conscious breath. Here he had heard his first rooster crow, seen his first pine trees, first watched white clouds lazily float across blue skies.

Sunday, June 22, brought the kind of morning country boys like best— warm, sunny, lazy. It was sheer joy to get up, to stretch, to run down the dirt road and feel the soft dust under tender bare feet.

Ilya and some friends had found a quiet corner—an old courtyard, strewn with lumber and broken bricks. Clotheslines stretched across it, and bulky chemises and purple undershirts fluttered in the breeze. Along the blind wall at the back of the court a tethered goat was nibbling the new grass.

The youngsters were playing soldier—White Russians against Red Russians. Finally they paused to catch a breath. One boy looked out through a chink in the wall to the street. A crowd was gathering at the corner—the biggest crowd he had ever seen. The boys raced through the courtyard and into the street just as a voice began to speak from the radio loudspeaker, set up on the telephone pole.

Vladimir Gankevich was up early on Sunday morning. This was an important day for Vladimir—the day of the track and field meet between teams representing Leningrad and the Baltic republics. Vladimir was a star of the Leningrad team, second only to the champion, Dmitri Ionov. The two were a dual entry in the running broad jump, and Vladimir was determined to make a fine showing.

He ate a light breakfast of bread and cheese, washed down with tea, and, putting his sweatshirt and shorts in a canvas bag, left the house about eleven o’clock. There were only a few people at the stop where he got on the bus, but Vladimir paid little attention. He was thinking about the meet. It was going to be a warm day. Already the sun felt hot. He hoped there might be a breeze off the gulf before the competition started.

He got off near the stadium and hurried toward the dressing rooms. Gradually, he became aware of something strange. There was no one in sight! Certainly he hadn’t got the date wrong. He was looking around in some confusion when he heard the sound of running steps. It was his younger brother, Kostya.

“Vladimir!” the boy shouted. “Vladimir! There’s news.”

Yelena Skryabina planned to visit nearby Pushkin that Sunday with her neighbor, Irina Klyuyeva, to see a sick child. Her older boy, Dima, and his inseparable friend, Sergei, were going to Peterhof, the palace which Peter and Catherine built to rival Versailles. This was the day that the Peterhof fountains, the famous golden Samson, and the long cascade down to the Baltic seashore was to open. Madame Skryabina was hurrying to finish her work on the typewriter when the telephone rang. It was her husband calling from his office. He had only a moment—no time to explain. He told her not to go out and to keep Dima at home. Then he hung up. But Dima had already left. What had happened? Madame Skryabina turned on the radio to see if there was any news.

The youngsters in Gryady, a little railroad town eighty miles southeast of Leningrad, stayed up most of Saturday night, singing and dancing at their high school graduation party, and most of them decided to gather on Sunday for a picnic at the lake. Ivan Kanashin said he’d meet his chum Andrei Piven at noon. The friends soon would separate, for Andrei planned to spend the summer working with a geological expedition surveying peat deposits around Gryady. Ivan was entering the engineering institute. It was almost breakfast time before Ivan went to bed, and when he felt his mother shaking his shoulder, he closed his eyes firmly and turned his head to the wall. His mother shook him again and said, “Wake up, Ivan. Wake up.” There was a strange note, something like terror, in her voice. Suddenly Ivan found himself wide-awake. The sun was streaming into the room and his mother was speaking to him.

Ivan Krutikov, a lathe operator, loved Leningrad’s white nights—the scent of the cherry blossoms, the heavy fragrance of the lilacs, the strolling all through the night. He and his friend Vasya Tyulyagin worked on the Saturday night shift, and Sunday morning they didn’t feel like going home. They went to the park at Pushkin and, toward noon, rented a boat and rowed about the idyllic little lake in the warm sun. They felt relaxed, tired and drowsy. Suddenly they noticed people running toward the great Cameron Gallery, the loveliest wing of the Catherine Palace.

The two young men pulled at the oars. Something had happened! As they drew near the shore, they could hear a voice talking over the radio loudspeaker.

It was quiet in Dmitri Konstantinov’s apartment. His relatives had gone to the country. In two weeks he would finish his studies at the institute and take a vacation. This morning he occupied himself with household chores. He and a neighbor had tickets for the performance at the Maly Opera Theater where
The Gypsy Baron
was playing—one of the season’s successes.

Konstantinov was about to leave to meet his friend when the telephone rang.

“Did you hear?” his friend said. “Shall we go to the theater or not? I’m almost out of my mind.”

“What are you talking about?” Konstantinov asked.

“What’s the matter with you?” his friend responded. “Haven’t you heard?”

“No.”

“Well, it’s like this. . . .”

The expanse of Palace Square still glistened from its morning washing as the guards and guides of the Hermitage Museum began to arrive at the employees’ entrance, across the square from the General Staff building.

The barometer beside the door stood at “clear.” The weather bureau predicted a fair, bright day. Already the sun was high over the blue Neva, and the wet paving stones reflected in aquarelle tints both the sun and the sky.

The museum workers straggled in through the service doors. One set of steps led up to the galleries. Another, small and curving, led to a room below where, once or twice a year, members of the staff assigned to air-raid protection gathered for a Civil Defense drill.

Today the staff, as it arrived, went down the narrow, curved staircase. A drill had been called. They were issued helmets, gas masks, first-aid kits, and told to wait.

Time passed slowly. The room was close. It was tiring. No one knew why the drill had been called. Then someone said the radio would announce an important government communiqué. About what? Nothing but music was to be heard on the radio.
²

The museum workers looked at the Sunday issue of
Leningradskaya Pravda
. Just the same old war news from Europe, Africa and Asia. A new dispatch from Samarkand: “Today work is continuing in the Gur Emir mausoleum.”

Eleven o’clock struck. The doors of the Hermitage swung open. Within minutes thousands of visitors scattered through the great halls. The guides began to take their groups around. They moved from room to room . . . the ceremonial apartments of the Winter Palace, the military gallery dedicated to the War of 1812, the Renoir collection, the Degas’, the great Rembrandt galleries, the collections of Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael. Finally, one guide, somewhat weary, brought some visitors to the Tamerlane rooms.

It was past twelve now, and below in the crowded room where museum guards, scientific workers, researchers and museum staff had gathered the radio was bringing the news.

All the Leningrad railroad stations were crowded that morning, most of all the Finland Station. It was here that Lenin was greeted on his return from Switzerland via Germany in the famous sealed train to Russia on April 16, 1917. Here he spoke from an armored car to the throngs of his revolutionary supporters. On this lovely June morning few of those who streamed to the Finland Station had thoughts of revolution in mind, although there were as always fresh flowers in a vase below the bust of Lenin which marked the historic spot. Crowds were buying tickets and cramming aboard trains for the resorts just north of the city along the Finnish Gulf and in Karelia— Sestroretsk and Terijoki. They bought ice-cream sandwiches from white-aproned
morozhenoye
girls as they waited for the trains to pull out and dropped twenty-kopek coins into the cap of the blind beggar who slowly made his way through the crowd, mournfully singing to the accompaniment of his accordion. Trains were leaving every half-hour, and there wasn’t a seat to spare. There were families with picnic baskets and young people with guitars and light haversacks over their shoulders.

Others were coming into Leningrad. The suburban train from Oranien-baum was filled with seamen from the training ships. Among them was Ivan Larin, captain of the thirty-five-ton trawler,
KTS-J06
, one of a squadron whose command was based on the famous old cruiser
Aurora
, now tied up at Oranienbaum. The
Aurora
was the naval hero of the Revolution— the ship whose guns opened fire with blanks on the Winter Palace on the evening of November 7, bringing about the surrender of the Kerensky supporters still holding out within the palace.

Larin, a veteran of service in the Pacific and the Black Sea, was planning to spend Sunday with his wife and three children in the little house where they lived in Okhta. The suburban train glided to a smooth stop at the Baltic Station. Larin stepped off with a firm quick stride and was nearing the entrance when he saw a crowd gathered around a radio loudspeaker. He made his way in that direction.

The naval fortress of Kronstadt was a special place, more like a great floating battleship than a city. It had its own life, its own customs, its own traditions. On the morning of Sunday, June 22, it was holding a holiday fete. On the Field of Bulls, an ancient pasture on the western side of Kronstadt, the traditional spring carnival was opening. From early morning buses had plied back and forth between the “city” of the fortress island and the field, bringing the sailors and their families to the
gulyaniye
.