Page 193 - The Chief Culprit

154 y e Chief Culprit

secure arm’s-length access to Romania’s undefended oil fields, which were two hundred kilo-
meters from the border.
Zhukov’s Southern front was ready to crush Romania, but in the sumer of 1940 he did
not have to fight. Romania’s leaders had witnessed the brilliant victories sustained by the Red
Army in Finland and had a clear understanding that it was better to accede to Stalin’s wishes
without battle. e sides agreed to a peaceful resolution of the conflict. At the end of June
1940 Romanian troops retreated from and Soviet troops entered Bessarabia and Northern
Bukovina. ese territories were added to the constituency of the Soviet Union.
In June 1940 three paths were open before the Southern front commanded by General
Zhukov: two were correct, one was deadly. e first correct path: deliver a blow to Bessarabia
and continue to advance toward the oil fields of Ploieşti. ree thousand Soviet tanks and
two thousand airplanes were more than enough to reach the oil fields and ignite a fire. is
would have meant the end for Germany. If the Southern front in June 1940 had dealt a blow
to Romania, World War II would have ended in 1940 with a victory by the Soviet Union and
an establishment of Communist regimes over the entire European continent. If the events
had unfolded in such a manner, giant colonies of the French, Belgian, and Dutch empires
would have been transferred to Stalin’s control.
e second path was more risky, but promised even more victories: in June 1940 Stalin
could have simply done nothing. He could have waited. He would not have had to wait
much longer. After defeating France, Hitler could have delivered a blow to Britain. e risk
for Stalin lay only in the fact that after the defeat of France, Britain and Germany could have
concluded peace. In that case, Stalin would have been left one-on-one against Germany.
However, if Hitler, as he planned, landed his troops in Britain, the task of “liberating” Europe
became much simpler: Zhukov would have struck the Romanian oil fields, then the Red
Army would have begun its “liberating operations” in Europe, all while the best German
troops were off the continent, in Britain, from where they could return immediately.
e third path was deadly. In June 1940 Zhukov’s Southern front took over Bessarabia
and Northern Bukovina—then halted halfway to the oilfields of Ploieşti.
Hitler said in 1942 that he was able to force Stalin to be satisfied in 1940 with Bessarabia
alone. is was not so. Firstly, in the summer of 1940 Stalin had not yet set for Zhukov the
objective of crushing Romania. Secondly, in 1940, in the heat of the fighting in France,
Hitler had no means of exerting influence over Stalin. If Stalin had ordered his troops to
crush Romania in the summer of 1940, nobody would have been capable of stopping the
advance of Zhukov’s Southern front.
As a result of the “liberation crusades” the distance from the new Soviet frontier to the
oil fields of Ploieşti was now just 180 km. is was a clear, open area. Troops from the Odessa
military district were concentrated at the very border, ready as soon as they got the first order
to continue the “liberation” right up to the oil wells. Soviet tanks numbered over three thou-
sand; the Romanians had sixty tanks. e Soviet “obsolete” BT-7M tank even officially had
a speed of 86 km/h (in reality it was faster). e Romanian tanks opposing it were FT-17s,
and had a maximum speed of 9 km/h. erefore, the Soviet tanks could just disregard their
Romanian opponents, ignore them and bypass them at their will. Even if one were to set one
thousand Soviet tanks against sixty Romanian ones, even then the remaining two thousand
could advance to Ploieşti unhindered, without leaving the main road and without maneuvers.
Even if they were to advance at only 25 km/h, they would have needed only seven to eight