Suicide: Why Did Hitler Attack the Soviet Union?
Viktor Suvorov
Sofia: Fakel Express, 2000; Pages: 365
Review © 2001 Branislav L. Slantchev
Because he was an idiot and his generals were incompetent cowards. That is the short and the long answer advanced in this reply to the critics of Suvorov's previous book ("The Icebreaker"). That book originated the claim that Hitler started a suicidal war that Germany had no hope of winning (ever!) because had he not done so, Stalin would have attacked him several months later, and the Red Army would have rolled over Europe with nothing in its way except the puny forces of the scattered Wehrmacht. One cannot fail to appreciate the irony of this scenario: the Nazi murderer who ranks third on the world scale saves Europe from the Communist murderer who ranks second (note: Mao is first). The question is indeed perplexing: why did Hitler attack the USSR? "Mein Kampf" and his last will and testament both make clear that he always considered France the greatest threat to Germany. He was aware of the consequences of Germany waging war on two fronts simultaneously. He was aware that the Battle for Britain was lost even before he went to Russia. He must have been aware that eliminating Poland as a buffer would put his empire into direct contact with the armies of the treacherous and utterly undependable Georgian. He must have known (or even if he didn't, his generals and strategists must and should have) that the German army was not prepared for such a war. Blitzkrieg in Russia is impossible, and fighting a prolonged positional war is equivalent to losing the war. This time there was no chance of revolution and Civil War to save Germany. So, why?
Suvorov replies: because he was a stupid self-involved dictator, who picked an entourage of sycophants, and because his generals and strategists (who realized the hopelessness of the whole endeavor) made a series of serious errors and after that blamed everyone else for them. That Hitler was stupid is beyond doubt. It did not take a genius to rise to power in a country torn by inflation, beset by economic ruin, and full of vengeful anger against the iniquity of the Versailles. Anyone could have done it. It did not take a genius to re-occupy the Ruhr when the might of the German army existed only in their propaganda. He was a good gambler, but not a good military commander. It did not take a genius to effect the Anschluss, or even Munich. But it did take an idiot to sign Molotov-Ribbentrop and attack Poland. It took an even bigger idiot to attack the USSR. Or did Hitler have a choice? Not according to Suvorov, who assembles an impressive catalogue of Soviet power. Tanks, armies, airplanes, paratroopers, mechanized infantry, ships, equipment... all getting ready for a march Westward. This was the content of his previous book. In this one, he finishes off by documenting the claims of German incompetence.
Yes, he concedes that the Germans were well organized in a bureaucratic sort of way. But was that good? Their command structures were inadequate and had conflicting lines of authority. The philosophy of blitzkrieg, which requires lightning tank attacks under the cover of the air force presupposes a unified command of both, which was the case in the Red Army, but not for the Wehrmacht (Hitler) and the Luftwaffe (Goering). The fleet had a third separate general staff (Doenitz) and SS---a separate fourth (Himmler). All working at odds with each other. The Germans did not have enough tanks, no middle or heavy weight tanks at all, no amphibious tanks either. Which the Russians did have in great numbers. The Russians also hade three strategic lines of defense, of which Barbarossa targeted the first (unaware of the other two). Although the Ural was important, it was not the only industrial base from which Stalin could mount a defense. Even Ural was practically unreachable for the oil-starved Germans, whose tanks, guns, and artillery in many cases dated back to the 19th century. This is in contrast to the modern Soviet arms that had no rival in the world. Stalin may have destroyed the rich country but all resources went into producing the ultra-powerful Red Army.
After detailing the idiocy and impotence of the German high command (unfortunately he relies almost exclusively on two memoirs, one of which is Speer's) Suvorov goes on to ridicule the German intelligence agencies that failed to examine their own high school textbooks on geography, that failed to ask eyewitnesses about the equipment which the Red Army had at its disposal, and that failed to question even their own engineers. Incompetence. Suvorov then claims that the Nuremberg trials were orchestrated by Stalin in order to silence anyone who might dream of revealing the Soviet plans for attack (this is somewhat weak).
However, the argument against the critics is convincing. Everyone knows that the Germans lost because the extreme Russian winter defeated them. Everyone is wrong, Suvorov says and has an excellent point, or rather, many points. If the German high command was as talented as often depicted, could they have failed to notice that Russia is huge and has winters? If they knew, why did they not plan for it? How could anyone hope to defeat the USSR in three months? Utterly impossible. And if they knew they could not do it in three months, why did they not plan for a longer war, including during the winter? Suvorov cites evidence to show that the Germans lost the war at the end of June. In fact, they lost the war in 1939 when they signed the pact with Stalin. One may wish for different atmospheric conditions but a high command must plan according to reality, not wishes. Suvorov says and one cannot disagree that the Germans did not draw the right conclusion from the Soviet debacle in the Finnish War of 1939-40. The Red Army did break through the theoretically impenetrable defenses and did so in an impassable terrain under arctic conditions. All deficiencies were then analyzed and corrected. For some reason the Germans took that was as a sign of Soviet weakness. Idiotic indeed.
The woeful inadequacy of the German war machine provides an explanation of Stalin and Zhukov's curious state of unpreparedness in June 1941. They simply could not believe that the Germans were in fact as stupid as they seemed. An oversight and an illustration of how dangerous it is to overestimate your enemy. There is some logic in the persistent misinterpretation of history which pinned the disaster of 1941 on the stupid Russian people, the antiquated Red Army and on the idiocy of Stalin and his high command. Suvorov claims the reason for this is simple---the party leaders starting with Khrushchev wanted to hide the truth that the Soviet Union was preparing the takeover of Europe. This is a controversial argument and one really wants to see the acclaimed Statistical Handbook of the Soviet Army during the Second World War (25 copies issued) which Suvorov uses to substantiate most of his claims. For now, it is only that---a fascinating but unsubstantiated argument because one must not only explain the curious silence of the Soviet and Russian historians but also the even more curious silence of their Western counterparts.
October 10, 2000. BLS
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