What Stalin Knew (12 page)

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mobilized army meant improving roads, rail lines, and telecommunica-

tions and constructing airfields, firing ranges, barracks, repair shops, hos-

pitals, warehouses, fuel storage tanks, and so on. At enormous expense,

work on these facilities went on intermittently all during the 1930s in the

Kiev and Belorussian Special Military Districts and also in the Far East,

reflecting concern with Germany and Japan as potential adversaries. With

the territorial expansion of 1939–40, Soviet western borders were moved

as much 400 kilometers westward. What was missing was the military

infrastructure that had taken many years to create along the old frontier.

The capacities of the road nets and railroads had to be increased; the latter

needed to convert their tracks to the broader Russian gauge. Although

existing structures such as barracks or warehouses could be adapted to

military needs, many had to be built from scratch. The most difficult prob-

lem, though, was the total absence of the kinds of fortifications, known as

the Stalin Line, that had already been constructed along the former state

frontier. Here is a description of fortifications along that line:

The original fortified areas, in Russian
ukreplennye raiony,
were be-

tween 50 and 140 kilometers in length, straddled major lines of com-

munications, and tended to have one or both flanks anchored on a

natural obstacle. The Kiev Fortified Area, for example, formed an

arc west of the city whose ends rested on the Dnepr River. The gen-

eral arrangement called for a support zone with a depth of ten to

twelve kilometers to precede a fortified area’s main defense zone;

the support zone’s scattered outposts and obstacles were supposed

to report, harass, and delay an enemy’s advance. Behind it, the block-

houses and pill boxes in the main defense zone were scattered across

a swath with a depth of three to four kilometers. Within it, a group-

ing of several fortifications formed a support point; a cluster of

three to five support points comprised a battalion defense area as-

signed to a machine gun battalion. The battalion defense area was

positioned so that its fixed weaponry dominated the routes through

(Map opposite page)
On the basis of the August 23, 1939, nonaggression

pact and its secret protocols, the USSR acquired eastern districts of

Poland that were incorporated into the Belorussian and Ukrainian

SSRs. Romania also ceded Bessarabia to the USSR. It was incorporated

into the Moldavian SSR. The acquisition of northern Bukovina and its

transfer to the Ukrainian SSR, as well as the incorporation of the Baltic

States into the USSR in 1940, were unilateral Soviet actions.

44

SOVIET BORDERS MOVE WESTWARD

the sector being protected. The two-story blockhouses and single-

story pillboxes typically were armed with machine guns mounted

in casemates. Embrasures with armored coverings enabled these

weapons to be fired to an emplacement’s front and sides. Fortifica-

tions were equipped with air filtration systems for protection against

chemical weapons, water storage tanks, generators, and land line

communications. The outfitting process was neither smooth nor

uniformly effective; for example, battalion defense areas were often

linked by unprotected open wire or tactical field cables because of

the failings of the buried cable industry. In addition to weapon em-

placements, there were command posts, communications centers,

personnel shelters, and depots distributed throughout a fortified

area. The fortifications themselves obtained additional protection

from anti-tank ditches, wire entanglements, and the minefields that

would be laid upon mobilization.34

Defensive operations were to provide only a brief interlude that al-

lowed for completion of mobilization and a rapid transition to the offen-

sive, in which the enemy would be decisively defeated, his homeland oc-

cupied, and socialism triumphant. This offensive spirit dominated Soviet

military thought in the 1930s. It, and the inability of Soviet military leaders

to rid themselves of the idea that the opening phases of the next war would

follow the leisurely pattern of previous wars, would make it difficult for the

Red Army to decide how to defend the new territories.

The issue now faced by Stalin and the general staff was what to do with

the existing fortified areas covering the old frontier and how and where to

build fortifications in the newly acquired territories in the west. Some,

such as Shaposhnikov, urged defense in depth, which meant retention of

the old fortifications so as to be able to fall back on them in the face of a Ger-

man assault. This view was anathema to Stalin, who did not wish to give up

a single
vershok
of the new land (a Russian unit of measurement equal to a

few centimeters). Indeed, motivated entirely by his desire to demonstrate

that Soviet power had advanced westward, Stalin would insist that for-

tifications in the western oblasts be constructed along the line of the new

border. This decision meant that German observers were able to follow the

progress of construction and pinpoint weaknesses, but Stalin, until the real

blow fell, was never one to be concerned with military details that coun-

tered his own views. Consequently, it was decided to shut down the Stalin

Line fortifications and remove their weapons for use in the new system.35

What actually happened? In the first place, all was not well with the

fortified areas of the original Stalin Line. On January 11, 1939, some time

SOVIET BORDERS MOVE WESTWARD

45

before the signing of the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact and its secret

protocol, the NKVD of the Ukrainian SSR informed the Central Commit-

tee of the Ukrainian Communist Party of the poor condition of the Kiev

Fortified Area: ‘‘Of the 257 structures in the area, only five are prepared for

combat action. They consist primarily of machine gun emplacements but

do not have special equipment such as communications, chemical protec-

tion, water, heating, light, etc. . . . At 175 of the 257 structures the natural

relief (mounds, hills, dense woods, bushes) limits the horizon of fire. The

forward sector of the permanent fortifications is only 15 kilometers from

Kiev which would permit enemy artillery to bombard Kiev without ap-

proaching the fortified area. . . . Hermetic seals around machine gun em-

brasures date from the years 1929–1930.’’ The list of deficiencies goes on

and on. ‘‘The Special Department of the Kiev Special Military District has

informed the command of the Kiev SMD of the fact that the Kiev Fortified

Area is not combat ready, but despite this nothing has been done,’’ the

report concluded. A similar report, on deficiencies at the Tiraspol Fortified

Area, was submitted to the Central Committee of the Ukrainian Commu-

nist Party the same day. First Secretary Nikita S. Khrushchev inserted this

resolution in the report: ‘‘Comrade Timoshenko. This is an important ques-

tion. It must be checked and discussed at the Military Council.’’ Khru-

shchev’s order did not carry much weight with Timoshenko because on

January 16, 1939, a third report on fortified area deficiencies was sent to

Kiev by the USSR NKVD. This time it was about the Mogilev-Yampolsky

Fortified Area. Apart from the usual design and equipment problems, the

area was criticized for its personnel shortages at the command level. Here

again, the report concluded by noting that the Special Department of the

Kiev Special Military District had brought this issue to the attention of the

commanding general, S. K. Timoshenko. Nothing was done.36

In November 1939, after the acquisition of the new territories, the

original fortified areas were abolished, the equipment put in long-term

storage, and the personnel reassigned. It seemed doubtful, given their de-

plorable state in early 1939, that the preservation of the older fortifications

would be carried out effectively. Indeed, when retreating Red Army units

tried to organize defensive positions in these fortified areas in July 1941,

they found them abandoned and overgrown with tall grass and weeds.37

It would not be until 1940 that construction would begin on fortified

areas along the new western border. Although in March 1941 responsi-

bility for the program would be given to Boris M. Shaposhnikov, for-

mer chief of the general staff, it was impossible to complete the plan for

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SOVIET BORDERS MOVE WESTWARD

constructing, equipping, and activating the new fortifications areas on the

western frontier. By the beginning of the war, the Soviets succeeded in

building 2,500 reinforced concrete emplacements, but only 1,000 of them

possessed artillery; machine guns were installed in the others. In the event,

these ‘‘isolated, half-finished fortifications . . . were reduced or bypassed on

the first day of the war.’’38

The decisions that brought this disaster about arose not simply from

Stalin’s rather simpleminded insistence on not giving up a centimeter of

the new Soviet lands but from the unrealistic planning of the Soviet mili-

tary, relying as it did on a slow, measured transition from a declaration of

war to frontier skirmishes to the enemy’s full mobilization. By the time it

recognized the real danger in the German deployments on the new borders

and tried to accelerate construction of new fortifications and reactivate the

older areas necessary for defense in depth, Soviet industry could not cope,

and Stalin remained convinced Hitler would not attack him in 1941.

∑

C H A P T E R

The Finns Fight

Proskurov Made a Scapegoat

The Soviet treaties of mutual assistance with the

three Baltic countries had barely been completed when Stalin decided it

was time to rearrange his northwest frontier with Finland. The Treaty of

Tartu with Finland in 1920 had awarded the Finns the Petsamo area in the

Arctic north and moved the border on the Karelian Isthmus to a point only

thirty kilometers from Leningrad. The danger to that city was evident, and

Stalin in early 1938 had begun to sound out the Finns’ willingness to agree

to frontier adjustments.

In April 1938 he had selected Boris A. Rybkin, NKVD legal resident

in Helsinki, to conduct secret negotiations with Finnish officials.1 At the

time, Rybkin used the name Boris N. Yartsev and his cover was that of

second secretary of the Soviet legation in Helsinki. The deputy resident

was his wife, Zoia I. Rybkina, who was under Inturist cover. In April 1938

they had been recalled to Moscow after three years in Helsinki. On the

evening of April 7, Rybkin was summoned to the Kremlin, where Stalin

told him of his selection; to make things easier for him, the ambassador

and counselor would be called back to Moscow, leaving Rybkin as chargé

d’affaires.2

Vaino Tanner, one of the Finnish officials whom Rybkin would even-

tually meet, described him as a ‘‘lively individual, pleasant in a way,’’ who

was said to ‘‘represent the GPU . . . the state police of the USSR . . . in the