Page 263 - The Chief Culprit

224 y e Chief Culprit

were in one train, shells in another. Battalions were unloaded where there were no staffs, staffs
where there were no troops. ere were no communication lines, since for safety reasons us-
age of many radio frequencies was banned. German troops also did not prepare dugouts and
build training ranges.
But the most important similarity was the huge quantity of supplies, troops, aviation,
hospitals, staffs, air bases—all this right on the Soviet borders, and very few people knew the
plan of action, which was kept in extreme secrecy. All that we see in the Red Army and dis-
count as stupidity was done, two weeks prior to that, in the German Wehrmacht. is is not
stupidity, but preparation for invasion.
What was supposed to happen after the gathering of the Second Strategic Echelon of
Soviet troops in the western districts of the country? e answer to this question was given
long before the beginning of World War II. General V. Sikorsky: “Strategic waiting cannot
last after all forces have been mobilized and concentration of troops achieved.” is was
10
said by the Chief of the General Staff of the Polish army, in the 1936 book e Future War.

However, according to a decision of the Soviet General Staff, the book was published in
Moscow for Soviet commanders. e book was published because Soviet military science had
earlier reached the same conclusion: “In modern conditions the worst idea in the beginning
stages of the war is to attempt to use a tactic of waiting.” 11
e advancement of the Second Strategic Echelon was not a reaction to Hitler’s ac-
tions. e creation of the Second Strategic Echelon began before the massive movements of
German troops to the Soviet borders. e movement of the Second Strategic Echelon was
a railroad operation that required lengthy preparations and extensive planning. Marshal S.
K. Kurkotkin said that the General Staff transferred all necessary documents concerning the
troop movements to the People’s Commissariat of Transportation on February 21, 1941. 12
But the General Staff also needed time to meticulously prepare those documents; they needed
to issue to the railroads precise orders about when, where, and what transport should be
supplied, how to conceal loading and transfer, what routes to use, where to prepare areas for
unloading the troops. In order to prepare all this, the General Staff had to determine exactly
what troops had to appear, and where and at what time. is means that the decision to create
the Second Strategic Echelon and the beginning of planning its movement and use for battle
must have come sometime earlier.
e process of creating troop formations in inner districts and moving them to western
border districts began on August 19, 1939. It originated with a decision by the Politburo; it
was never stopped, and slowly gained momentum. Here is just one example: the Ural military
district. At the end of August 1939 the 85th Division was formed; in September 1939, the
159thDivision was formed. We see the 85th Division on June 21, 1941, right at the German

borders in the region of Augustow, where the NKVD is cutting through barbwire. e 159th
Division we find right on the border as well, in the Rava-Russkaya region, in the 6th Army.
In the same month of September 1939, in the same Ural district, the 125th and 128th Rifle
Divisions were created, and each of them we can later find on the German borders. Moreover,
according to Soviet sources, the 125th was “on the immediate borders” of East Prussia. e

Ural district formed many other regiments and divisions, and all of them quietly crawled
closer to the borders.
After the German invasion, the Second Strategic Echelon (as well as the first) was used
for defense. But that does not at all mean that it was created for that purpose. General M. I.