Page 216 - The Chief Culprit

Destruction of the Stalin Line y 177

for defense after he signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. As a result, the Stalin Line was dis-
armed and then dismantled: Stalin was not planning to fight on his territory. After Germany
got bogged down in a war against Great Britain, Stalin no longer needed the fortified regions
in the depths of Soviet territory.
Hitler faced the same situation, not only on his eastern borders but on the western
ones as well. ere, in the 1930s, he built the Siegfried Line. Traditionally, since the times
of the Franco-Prussian War, a German attack on France was always planned in the north.
e Siegfried Line was built to the south of that direction—in other words, on a secondary
location—following the principle of attacking the primary and fortifying the secondary loca-
tion. In 1940, the German army advanced far west, and the Siegfried Line became useless.
At that time, Hitler had no idea that in four years he would have to defend his own borders
again. e Siegfried Line was abandoned. Its new use was quite unusual—the military con-
structions were given to farmers for storing potatoes. Some of the military structures had
their unbreakable armored doors locked from within; when someone wanted to get in, the
keys were nowhere to be found. 20
We could, of course, call outstanding Soviet and German generals idiots. But stupidity
is not the explanation here. Simply put, both sides were aggressors. Both were thinking in
terms of attack, and when fortifications could no longer be used for invasion, they tore them
down or put them to whatever use they saw fit.