Review of Chapter 3 of Alexy Isaevs critique of Suvorovs Ice Breaker.

Why exactly was the Red Army re-positioning troops further West just prior to the start of Operation Barbarossa?

Mr Book brings us another contrarian take from a credentialed Russian Academic on a topic near and dear to many Western dissident Rightwingers.

The following book review is yet another that was originally meant for Rurik Skywalkers Slavland Chronicles. Due to Ruriks ill-fated vacation and illness he didn’t get around to editing it up to his standards therefore there are some references to that fine blogs readers and author in the text.

This long review ought to cause a fairly outraged shit storm should anyone read it so in advance I want to thank everyone who gives it a fair hearing. The book is called Anti Suvorov so the thesis should be fairly self explanatory.

The author is Aleksy Isaev who is the author of a few books about WW2 and in Russia he is a fairly well known author and historian. It wouldn't be an exaggeration at all to call him the leading contemporary historian of the Red Army from its early days until 1945. Besides Anti Suvorov I read his book about the Battle of Stalingrad which is the only one of his translated into English. I can't say I recommend his work for the casual enthusiast, it's all very detail heavy and often isn't easy reading. He does however bring all the receipts for everything he claims straight from the official archives. Like my review of the Mozgovi book I’ll need to break this up into a few parts because this is an argument where the components need to be examined separately and then the whole put together. If I can show that the Red Army's movement to the Western frontier in the months leading up to Barbarossa doesn't at all prove that the USSR was going to attack Germany that doesn't disprove Suvorovs claims in their totality, but nonetheless it does need to be shown that this movement wasn't necessarily offensive and that requires getting into details. So in this first installment we will cover that specifically. In further installments should the readership (assuming anyone reads this to begin with) express interest we will cover what General Staffs did in those days and the War Doctrines of countries like the USSR, Germany and France. Covering that is also important because along with the Red Armys movement West in the weeks leading up to Barbarossa the mere fact that the USSR had offensive plans is held up as proof of intent to start an unprovoked war. However every great power did this back in those days, the Von Schifflen plan being the most famous example but for some reason right wingers never claim the mere existence of the VS plan means Germany is guilty of starting WW1 which is reasonable enough because the mere existence of the VS plan is not actually proof of intent to start a war.

I guess it’s mandatory to say here that same as with my Holodomor article that Soviet apologetics is not my intention but I am a Russophile and I reject the claim that Russians were just a hapless biomass forced to fight exclusively against its interests throughout the Soviet era right up until a cabal of benevolent Goldman Sachs bankers and spooks dismantled the country. The Soviet period is a very nuanced subject and it's beyond the scope of this book review to cover all those nuances, but Suvorovs claims have to be understood as being within the framework of weaponized anti Stalinism. Despite the fact that Stalin wasn't our guy and the USSR wasn't based it needs to be understood that weaponized anti Stalinism was and still is a thing whose purpose was to serve as the ideological explosives used to destroy the foundations of the USSR. You might think the destruction of the USSR was a good thing but time has not born that out yet if you are a Russophile. 30+years after the USSR was liquidated and auctioned off to well connected ethnic bankers and pornographers and we have a steady democide of East Slavs that's worse anything that happened in the Soviet era, we have war in Ukraine and Russia proper, we have Russians being treated as 2nd class citizens in all the former Soviet Republics including Russia proper, Belarus is about to become Northern Pakistan #2 after the UK, the ethnic neoconservative community has more power in Russia than they ever did under Stalin (by 1937 they had to play ball with Stalin but they just dictate to Putin) etc etc. In short I understand those who applaud the USSRs demise but I challenge anyone who fancies themselves a Russophile to demonstrate some good fruits that have blossomed in the meantime. The reason I feel the need to say all this is besides denying that I'm just a crypto Stalinist, Duginist, Eurasianist is because time has shown that the USSRs demise was set in motion by people who did not have the best interests of East Slavs at heart. In fact those people hate Slavs and all Europeans in general, and Suvorovs work needs to be understood as being a very small contribution this project. I understand that for a Western rightwinger it sounds strange to say that someone claiming NS Germany launched a pre-emptive strike against the USSR is working for people that haven't our best interests in mind, but Suvorov was literally a GRU defector with MI6 handlers which is not even debatable, and he wouldn't have written IceBreaker without their approval. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the KGB just told him to defect and crank out some anti Soviet literature. If you seriously believe "well yeah sure the spooks are bad but when they tell us about how bad the USSR was they are always telling the unvarnished truth every single time because....you know communism" then you basically believe that a bunch of aggrieved Trotskyites whose whole plan was to loot the USSR and democide Russians are unbiased source in regards to the country that they hated the most. NB4 "but they hated NS Germany the most" yes maybe they did from 1933-1945 but during the cold war the CIA and Western European spook agencies were working with so called "Fascist" in Europe. See Operation Gladio for example.

To be straight up front with the readership my personal conviction is that the USSR was absolute hell on earth for Russians right up until the late 20s and then it just sucked. By about 1937 after Stalin had thoroughly consolidated power and purged his rivals there was probably less hand rubbing going on in the USSR than in the US and there was definitely less so than in the UK. Once more this is not a claim that the USSR was based, but I'm also of the opinion that neither the US nor UK have any moral superiority over the USSR. None whatsoever and following from that none of the claims of Western spooks and Soviet defectors carry any more weight in my book than the claims made by the Soviets themselves. Unfortunately Western rightwingers who normally are very critical thinkers tend to take any anti USSR claims at total face value. The refrain that never under any circumstances would our overlords want a book to be published claiming Hitler launched a preventive strike doesn't hold up to scrutiny. Just check out the latest news about the 4chan hacks and how many posters and admins were located in Israel. Look how much better off the ethnic coin/foreskin clipper community is doing in modern Russia compared to Stalins. Once more, Suvorovs book needs to be understood as being part of the project that was meant to bring about modern Russia. In Ukraine today the ever growing holocaust survivor community and "National Socialist" work together just fine. Kirill Budanov will one day be hanging out with Andrei Biletsky and the next with Learned Elders. Dennis Kapustin who is the head of the Russian Volunteer Corps and a self professed "Nazi" literally has ancestors persecuted by Nazis and Cossacks for no reason. The point is that spooks and those who are constant victims of canards are okay with engaging in some strategic NS sympathizing in pursuit of greater goals. By no means does this mean I'm shilling for victims of red herrings, like many Russians I have no trouble understanding that NS Germany had legitimate reasons for doing what it did but also not believing they launched a preventive war against the USSR.

But onto the book, the first part I want to review is chapter 3 which covers the Red Army moving to the western frontier prior to Barbarossa kicking off. That's the thing Western rightwingers site the most so it's where we will start. Isaev leads off the chapter quoting Suvorov:

The Communist justified the creation of the second strategic echelon of the Red Army and its movement to the Western frontier of the country by saying Churchill warned them, Zorge warned them, someone else warned them, in a word the movement of the second strategic echelon was a reaction to the movement of Hitler. This explanation doesn't withstand scrutiny. General of the Army I.V. Tulinev during the very first moments of the German invasion spoke with Zhukov in the Kremlin. Here are Zhukovs words "I reported to Stalin but he didn't believe it at first, he considered it a provocation of the German Generals". I can bring forth thousands of such examples but it's been shown by many before me that Stalin didn't believe in the possibility of a German attack, even after the attack had started he didn't believe it. From the Communist historians we receive quite the paradox, Stalin conducted the biggest regrouping of troops in the history of mankind to prevent an attack, the possibility of which he considered impossible.

Isaev:

Lets turn to real documents in Historical Academic circles there has long been a document in circulation called "Instructions to the Peoples Commissar of Defense S.K. Timoshenko and Manager of the General Staff G.K. Zhukov, Commanders of the border regions are to bring their soldiers to battle readiness due to the possibility of a sudden attack from Fascist Germany on the USSR"

Isaev calls our attention to the fact that this document was signed by Stalin on the evening of the 21st of June so right from the start we have a problem to reconcile. How could Stalin have been surprised by the German attack when he just signed an order a few hours before instructing the troops on the Western Frontier to come to battle readiness? Isaev offers a very straightforward and obvious answer:

He could for a certain time not believe that Germany would launch an invasion of the USSR without any attempt at political pressure

There is a reason that Barbarossa is traditionally referred to as a "surprise" attack. Us rightwingers often go on and on about how hard Hitler tried to make peace with the Brits and avoid war with them, how much he tried to solve his issues with Poland via negotiations, well none of that happened in the case of the war against the USSR. Hitler broke with his previous MO pretty hard and this is what caught Stalin totally flat footed. As a rule, wars break out after a long period of political haggling. All of Hitlers previous military interventions certainly followed that pattern. That's how WW1 went down. That's how the USSRs war against Finland went down. Even the Japs surprise attack against the US didn't really come out of the blue because the US was putting tons of diplomatic and economic pressure on Japan. Stalin on the other hand really was observing the letter of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and was sending raw materials to Germany right up to till the war started.

Isaev:

War is a continuation of politics, that which can’t be achieved via peaceful means is reached via war. There are many examples of this precedent. Before the invasion of Poland there was a rough and drawn out political confrontation. On the 24 October 1938 Ribbentrop met with the Polish Ambassador in Germany Joseph Lipckovo where Poland was asked to return Danzig, allow the construction of an autobahn on the territory of the Polish corridor and to join the Anti Comintern pact. War broke out after almost a year of attempts to solve the conflict via peaceful means

Stalin wasn't shocked that war broke out at all, he was shocked that it started the way it started. Germany made no demands, didn't make any diplomatic complaints or attempt to level pressure or anything of the sort. All the same Stalin was receiving intelligence indicating an attack and a few hours before the invasion kicked off he issued the order Isaev quoted above to bring the troops to battle readiness. It appears Stalin trusted the spooks, both his own and the foreign ones less than he trusted his understanding of Hitlers MO. The result was he was caught off guard when Barbarossa started. Another point that Isaev doesn't bring up but is relevant here is that one of the reasons the USSR was able to bounce back from the initial invasion and start industrially out producing Germany in short order was because Moscow started moving the USSRs heavy industry east beyond the Urals well before the war started. Why would Stalin have done that if he thought there was no way the USSR was ever going to be attacked? If he was just planning to attack Germany right quick without any concern that Germany might beat him to the punch then moving heavy industry from Europe to Siberia would just be an unnecessary interruption. Obviously he was very aware that war on Soviet territory was possible hence his surprise couldn't have been because of that but rather outrage that he pegged Hitler wrong to disastrous consequences.

From here Isaev moves on to addressing the argument that the Red Armys movement to the Western Frontier indicated aggressive intent. He starts off discussing the second strategic echelon of the Red Army in the West which Suvorov presents as being a uniquely aggressive formation. However a second strategic level echelon in those days was absolutely standard operating procedure going back to WW1. Im assuming most readers will have an idea of what strategic echelons are but in case someone doesn't its basically a large grouping of units meant to react to how a battle develops which is initiated by the 1st echelon. Think of an infantry squad as a basic crude analogy, a US Army light infantry squad has 2 fire teams. In the most basic react to contact battle drill one fire team reacts to enemy contact and the second will react to how this initial contact develops. If overcoming the enemy is possible the 2nd team will flank and attack the enemy. If retreat is called for the second team lays down covering fire to facilitate the retreat of the 1st team. The echelons being addressed here are the maxed zoomed out expression of this basic principle.

Isaev:

Before the first world war a second strategic echelon existed in Russia. Its troops moved from their permanent basis right up to the presumed place where battle would take place or to the National Border.

So as per Suvorovs criteria, which is a second strategic echelon existing at all we have the culprit for who is at fault for WW1 and its Russia...but then as per Suvorov having offensive plans on paper is also criteria for establishing guilt and Germany definitely had those in WW1 and also their own analogies to strategic echelons..yeah this is getting confusing. Its almost like Suvorov is just taking the banal and routine and presenting it as extraordinary. In any case the Second Strategic echelon as per standard military theory of the time was supposed to be a flexible force capable of either aiding in defense or going on the offence and once more, this second echelon was absolutely critical because the first echelon was going to be tied up either in defensive fighting should the country be invaded, or breaking the enemies immediate defense in the case of a general offense. The second echelons' very existence proves nothing one way or the other.

In Icebreaker Suvorov quotes some Soviet officers commanding large units in the first echelon that received orders to move close to the Western Frontier in the weeks leading up to the war breaking out, Isaev quoting Suvorov in Icebreaker:

Colonel General I.I. Ludnikov (at that time commander of the 200th rifle division of the 31st rifle corpus) was one of those who fulfilled an order to move to the border. Directives to the division HQ were received from the head of the military district on the 16th of June 1941. The division was instructed to approach (the border) in full complement and concentrate in the forest 10-15km northeast of of the border city of Kovel. Movement was to be conducted completely secret, only at night in forested areas

Scary stuff to be sure but not evidence of intent to initiate a sneak attack as Suvorov would have us believe. Isaev gives us an identical recollection on the eve of WW1 from Boris Shapshnikov who would go on to become the Red Armys Chief of General Staff. Shapshnikovs Calvary division has received a coded message that he has to de-code:

The telegram from Corps HQ was short and within 20 minutes its contents lay in front of me. I checked one more time to make sure my de-coding was correct and then left in the direction of the horse racing field at a trot so as to arrive there soon. The telegram contained few words but its content was gravely important, high command had stated that on the 13th of June preparations for war time were to begin. The troops were to immediately begin movement to their winter quarters.

Yes, moving to winter quarters in the middle of June.

Isaev points out that obviously this is analogues to the instructions received by the 200th rifle division which Suvorov holds up as grave circumstantial evidence that the USSR was about to attack Germany. If we are being consistent here Shapshnikovs recollection indicates that Russia was about to attack Germany in WW1.. presumably unprovoked and for no reason. But then again Germany had the most thorough and well-oiled offensive plans so who to blame here? Did Germany deserve Versailles because of the Von Schifflen plan or did the Tsar and his family deserve their fate because of their 2nd strategic echelon and Shapshnikovs Calvary moving quickly from their usual base to the border before the war started? Help me out respected readers. In seriousness, taking the routine and presenting it as a crazy bombshell is the essence of Suvorovs MO.

Isaev spends a few pages demonstrating just how strongly the movement of the Russian Empires strategic echelons on the eve of WW1 resembled the movement of the USSRs on the eve of Barbarossa. A quick example:

Vladimir Bogdanovich (Suvorov) sings us a song about the Moscow military district (Isaev is referring to Suvorov holding up the strengthening of the Moscow district as evidence of the USSRs aggressive intent). He is counting on the reader not knowing that in 1914 the Grenadier Corps of the South Western Front which in peace time was spread out from Voronezh to Nizhni Novgorod was transferred to the Moscow district. Besides the Grenadier Corps the 17th Corps from Ryzan, the 25th infantry Corps from Yaroslav and in August the Siberian Corps were added to the Moscow district.

Once more, routine movements in very tense and high stakes pre-war circumstances being totally misrepresented on Suvorovs end. Of course one can argue that the Russian Empire was about to attack Germany because WW1 was around the corner, but this is absolutely neither here nor there as for establishing who brought about the circumstances which made the war inevitable in the first place. Obviously if the National Leadership expects a conflict to pop off, even one they don't want necessarily they would make the exact same movements. France and Poland did in 1939, Finland did before the Winter War. Rejecting Isaevs claim that the USSR was reacting to the many warnings it received about Barbarossa by moving troops West and Stalins surprise being due to Germany attacking without making demands leaves the person going with Suvorovs version having to explain what was unique about the USSR repositioning troops during the lead up to Barbarossa. And there is actually nothing.

One difference however between the lead up to WW1 and WW2 is that in WW1 mass use of railways to reposition troops happened after War was declared whereas in WW2 it had to happen before. Its fairly obvious why, motorized troops which were absent in WW1 move fast, therefore events move faster in general and you need to have all your pieces on the board where you think you will need them much sooner. Failing to do this correctly can be catastrophic as Poland found out first.

Isaev gives us some details about what went wrong with Poland which helps shed light on exactly why the USSR was steadily repositioning troops about a week before Barbarossa got rolling. Isaev talks about the Polish Army being partially mobilized before the war started which is a throwback to chapter 2 where he demonstrates that partial mobilization before war was standard, prudent and totally normal practice therefore its not at all evidence that the USSR was about to attack Germany. Ill cover that as well in part 2 but the Red Armys repositioning of troops to the Western border and apparently being in "attack positions" is what Western Rightwingers site the most often so that's why I'm leading with Chapter 3.

Lets start with the first victim of the war, Poland. After the already mentioned partial mobilization the Polish Army started repositioning troops in March of 1939. The 20th Reserve infantry division started moving South West from Piotrkuva and the Newgrydskaya Calvary Brigade to the North from Plotska. But the general strategic repositioning of troops didn't start until the 26th of August, a week before the start of the war. On that day detachments of the Polish Army received orders to move to their respective intended areas of concentration (he means regiments were instructed to unite with their divisions and divisions to unite with their corps etc). Orders to the operational groups of the first echelon (yes Poland had strategic echelons) were issued only on the 30th of August, 2 days before the war. Many detachments were moved through the entire country via railroad from 500-800km. When the Germans finally attacked of 47 intended concentrations only 24 were completed (what he means is that the Poles wanted 47 pieces on the board but only 24 were positioned where they were supposed to be and at full strength when the war started). While in a state of movement to their intended area of deployment in the period from the 1-5th of September 18 Polish detachments were mauled by German aviation significantly hindering the concentration and deployment of these detachments ruining the prewar Polish plan.

The Polish Army deploying too late was a fatal mistake. To be extra precise, Poland failing to mobilize more and move more units to the Western frontier before the war started actually lost Poland the war. Isaev details how Polish units were mauled on the railroads and then had to get off the wagons already under fire. Some Polish detachments had to change stations en route and simply never arrived where they were needed. What conclusions would the Soviet General Staff have drawn from this? I guarantee it wasn't "The Poles should have started concentrating their forces even later". Needless to say, as per Suvorovs criteria this movement of the Polish Army which started before the war would have to indicate that Poland intended to attack. We have separate echelons, we have mass movement by rail, movement to the assumed place of battle before the war etc. So if Suvorov were being consistent, he would need to necessarily claim Germany fought 2 pre-emptive campaigns. Now maybe Poland was going to attack hoping that the Brits and French were going to help them from the west. I'm not ruling that out by any means however we absolutely need to note that the Polish campaign showed just how critical having your pieces in place where they are needed, at full strength and on time is life and death and this is true for both offense and defense. Let’s not forget just how damn enormous the USSRs Western borders were, so this was even more existential for them. Another thing that needs to be hammered home here is that lets say the Polish were indeed going to attack Germany and Germany pre-empted them, the Poles after all are known for picking villainous, duplicitous allies and engaging in suicidal behavior. The actual problem was still that half the Polish Army didn't arrive where it needed to be on time and at full strength. The problem wasn't that the Poles were in "attack positions" it was that they just weren't in place and ready to go when the war started. The Germans started playing with their pieces in place and the Polish started with half absent. This is exactly what happened to the USSR when Barbarossa broke despite the Soviets trying to get ahead of the game (though we are going to see later that the USSR also started mass movement way too late). There are a few reasons for this which Isaev explains going on. But before that he gives us examples of pre war French and German practices which serve as more concrete and descriptive examples of how managing your military disposition in the lead up to hostilities can decide the outcome of the conflict.

From the 21-23 of August, more than a week before the declaration of war French Divisional cadres were loaded onto trucks and brought to positions on the border. On the 27 of August instead of a hidden mobilization a general mobilization was declared which was meant to bring 50 divisions to readiness. This general mobilization however was not completed in time for France to offer Poland any significant help in the decisive opening days of the war

Isaev contrasts this with Germany:

Germany conducted a much more thorough and consistent type of hidden preparation for war. The Germans completely shifted the entire process of concentration and mobilization to peacetime. Concentration and deployment of German troops to East Prussia started on the 6th of August 1939 under the pretext of commemorating the 25 year anniversary of the 1914 battle of Tannenberg. As a result of this measure of 58 detachments meant for action in Poland 29 were already in place (by the 23 of August). In tandem with discreet unofficial mobilization further concentration and deployment measures were conducted right up until the start of hostilities. By September 1st 43 full strength German formations were in place, practically the entire German force to be used in the initial thrust against Poland. 43 full strength German formations vs 24 Polish, the outcome is not difficult to predict.

The Germans were very well led in battle as a rule but any one who is at all well read about WW2 should know that it's a big misconception that German tanks and warplanes were especially cutting edge technology wise in the early years of the war. In fact especially in terms of tanks and anti tank guns the Germans were somewhat behind in performance in many respects until mid 1942ish roughly. German artillery was good but no better really than the allies in technical specifics. What made the early WW2 German Army such a beast at war was that they got the very best out of what they had. Basically with the Polish campaign they rigged the game by getting more of their pieces on the board at full strength where they needed to be at the moment of truth. This entailed getting those pieces in place during peacetime, and Suvorovs whole case against the USSR is that they were attempting to do just this in the run up to Barbarossa. In other words per Suvorovs criteria Germany was definitely the bad guy with aggressive intentions against Poland because they prepared for war better. Respected readers, can you see how inane Suvorovs accusations actually are?

For any country to sit on its hands and not do anything to prepare for conflict at a time when conflict might be around the corner is just stupid and not realistic unless we are speaking of the Russian Federation now days. What side you personally sympathize with in said conflict is beside the point entirely. Prepping the ground before the killing starts is life and death, failing to prepare is preparing to fail as they say. As Isaev shows us here the Germans prepared the best yet Suvorov to my knowledge never wrote any "bombshell" book whose subtext is that Germany was sneaky and morally reprehensible because they lived up to his asinine criteria of establishing who is the aggressor.

Our illustrious Blog Overlord often rales and warns against the bitter and rotten fruits of moralitarian ethics. Being in full agreement with him about that I want to emphasize that I sincerely applaud Germany's thorough and professional work in rigging the game in their favor despite their early technical limitations. We are talking war after all, not a game of chess like I am with my analogies. The emotional need to have your protagonist always conducting himself in a chivalrous manner in a hostile world where the global powers that be want his nation destroyed is understandable but not reasonable. If you plan on clinging to the Suvorov thesis then you must admit that in the case of the Polish campaign Germany checked more of the "bad guy aggressor" boxes than Poland. Sure Poland checked some as well but Germany just checked more which is exactly why they so thoroughly smashed Poland in the first place.

Suvorovs exercise in uncovering aggressive bad guy behavior to establish guilt is definitely a double edged sword for those who take it up for ideological/emotional reasons and at best as we are seeing here it doesn't even show what it's claimed to show. I think a solid majority of us who follow this fine blog agree that Germany wasn't actually the bad guy in the Polish campaign. Nonetheless they are the guilty party using Suvorovs tedious criteria. We haven't even touched on basic great power war doctrine from those days, but even in the case of a defensive war Soviet, French and German doctrine all favored moving into offense as fast as possible and fighting on enemy soil even in the case of a defensive war. Suvorov doesn't even address this but obviously it has some serious implications when it comes to analysis of prewar troop movements. For example, in this light Germany rightfully saw itself as fighting a defensive war against Poland via subjugating them very fast on their soil. Engaging in bean counting of troop movements and analysis of offensive plans in a vacuum shows exactly nothing but that's the sum total of Suvorovs work. Anyway, I said earlier that I don't believe Germany launched a pre emptive war against the USSR and we will start getting to why in this installment as so far what we have covered is just enough to show that at best Suvorovs evidence is simply ambiguous. So let's keep going.

After his analysis of German pre war troop movements Isaev addresses the Finns:

In a situation of tense diplomatic relations with the USSR Finland moved its troops to the border which gave them a marked advantage in the opening struggles against the Red Army.

Isaev quotes Mannerheim:

However, now the starting situation was totally different, I wanted to shout that round 1 was going to go for us, both the covering troops and the field army were able in time and in excellent condition to transfer to the front.

Needless to say, accomplishing this required mobilization and movement before the war started. Those sneaky dastardly Finns who weren't sitting on their hands until the last second so as to avoid checking boxes as per Suvorovs bad guy criteria. By the way it's a common misconception that in the early days of the Winter War that highly outnumbered but plucky Finn's were mowing down hapless Commie hordes. In reality the ratio of Soviet to Finnish troops in the 1st engagements of the Winter War was 1.5-1 in favour of the Soviets who were on the offensive. That is the Soviets had not concentrated enough force at the front to break the Finns per the well known 1-3 concentration superiority generally required for successful offensive operations. Had the Finns not taken the prudent measures of mobilization and movement to the border in peacetime they would have lost in the opening days obviously. One day I might write a book about how the USSR launched a preventive war against Finland.

Now that we have established the proper context for analyzing the Soviet troop movements to the Western frontier by analyzing analogues situations from other countries we can get on to examining the Soviet case before Barbarossa in more detail. The only big difference is the scale, the USSR was a much bigger country with much bigger borders so obviously more troops would be involved.

Isaev quoting Suvorov/Icebreaker:

After Germany started a preventive war the second strategic echelon just like the 1st was used for defense. This absolutely does not mean that it was created for that purpose however. General M.I. Kazakov said of the second echelon "after the war started its planned use underwent a cardinal change. General-Major V. Zemskov put it even more bluntly, "we were compelled to use those reserves for defense instead of offense as planned".

Isaev brings our attention back to the Polish case. Troops simply never arrived where they were needed thus formations meant for attack end up needing to plug holes in the front or simply retreating as they were constantly threatened with encirclement. This isn't complicated. Let's put this as plain as possible, the Soviet Generals Suvorov is quoting aren't saying "those reserves with which we wanted to launch a surprise attack against Germany ended up having to plug holes in our lines due to Germanys preventive war against us". That's not even what they are implying but not saying plainly because they are scared of Stalin. In plain military terms he is saying the Red Armys reserves put aside on the Western frontier to be used for offensive action were needed to plug holes. Now if this in your book constitutes proof of intent to launch an aggressive war the onus is on you to demonstrate that no army ever under any circumstances, even during tense diplomatic circumstances has offensive reserves put aside just in case. Good luck. For example, let's say Poland had actually beaten Germany to the punch and attacked first in 1939, you would have German officers saying the exact same thing that the Soviet ones above are saying. Sure, Germany would have won a moral victory due to losing the mobilization and deployment game and consequently would have been forced to use their offensive reserves on the defense instead. On the other hand, we all agree here moral victories are the most beautiful so maybe that would have been for the best. What needs to be driven home hard here is that the mere existence of reserves put aside for offensive use doesn't establish intent to start an offensive war. Yet again, by that dumb criteria everyone involved in both WW1 and 2 are guilty. Even Finland had reserves put aside for offensive action during the Winter War before the War started. Yes in scale they were very small compared to the USSR but the scale of that war was just smaller in general.

Isaev quoting Suvorov/Icebreaker:

In March, April and May a grandiose, secret relocation of Soviet troops to the West was carried out. The rail network of the whole country was involved in the colossal secret operation. It was completed on time, but tens of thousands of wagons needed to return thousands of kilometers in the opposite direction. Therefore, on the 13th of June when another super large secret relocation of troops was initiated there just weren't enough wagons for the whole army

The USSR wasn't Monaco or Andora, it was a colossally big country so accordingly any mass relocation of troops would be correspondingly colossal regardless of whether those troops were intended for starting a war or not. But that's not even the most striking thing about Suvorovs claim. Isaev shows that Suvorov is just sort of making stuff up and going forward we will see this again. Isaev about this unprecedented relocation of Soviet troops:

The scale of the relocation of Soviet troops in April and May was very unremarkable. On the 26 April Zabaikal and the Far Eastern Districts received orders to prepare one mechanized and two rifle Corps and two airborne brigades for redeployment. On the same day the Ural Military District was given orders to rebase 2 divisions to the Baltic District before the 10 of May. Before the 15 of May 1941 the Siberian Military District was instructed to send the 201th Rifle Division to the Western Military District and the 225th Rifle Division to the Kiev Military District.

So in late April 2 corps and 2 brigades in the far East received orders to get ready to move...but apparently they didn't go anywhere over the next month. No genuinely massive relocations happened in April. In May a sum total of 4 divisions were sent West from the interior of the country. We aren't talking about Luxembourg guys. We are talking about the USSR whose borders ran from the Baltic to the Black Sea. 4 division is absolute miloch as the Russians would say. Furthermore these 4 divisions were re-formed into anti-tank brigades who did not yet have heavy weapons...so actually in the short term the USSRs overall lethality went down. Along with these 4 divisions from the East ten Sapper Battalions arrived, which Suvorov presents as especially suspicious.

Isaev quoting Suvorov who is quoting

General-Lieutenant V.F. Zomov (at that time General-Major, head of engineering troops):

The Sapper Battalions were organized in accordance with Wartime regulations. Ten Battalions from the Far East were fully armed.

What Suvorov doesn't clarify, probably on purpose, is what the Sappers were working on. Isaev:

The Sappers detached from the Divisions of the Interior Military Districts worked on building and improving the defensive infrastructure of the Molotov Line.

Isaev correctly notes that Suvorovs primary method of investigation consists of:

Taking the quotes he needs out of context and ignoring facts that contradict his theory.

That's fair enough imo. If the working assumption of Icebreaker is that Stalin believed no invasion was possible under any circumstances, then why send 10 Sapper Battalions to work on improving the Molotov Line as opposed to like a few mechanized Battalions. Or a tank Battalion. Let’s put this in context, over the past month 4 infantry divisions were sent West, and these infantry divisions were reformed as anti tank brigades and 10 sapper battalions to work on the Molotov Line. Considering just how much border had to be covered this is so little as to be insignificant and the nature of the arrivals isn't especially offensive.

Now this movement Isaev is covering is the sum total of April and May. There was comparatively speaking much more in June but Suvorovs theory requires a few extra months because just covering the immediate weeks before the war actually lends credence to the idea that the USSR really was reacting to the German build up happening concurrently. But in reality, there was no feverish redeployment going on in April or May, what's feverish for San Marino is not feverish for the USSR.

Now we start getting into more details of the mechanics of why Barbarossa was such a catastrophe for the USSR and eventually that will cover why I personally don't see any possibility of the USSR planning on starting a war anytime in the immediate future after June 22 1941. Unfortunately though we have to keep deconstructing Suvorovs constant non contextual misrepresentations and outright lying sometimes for a little longer.

Isaev quoting Suvorov/Icebreaker again:

In the entire 1st strategic echelon there were 170 tank, Motorized, Calvary and Rifle Divisions. 56 of these were located right on the National Border. The rest of the 114 Divisions of the 1st echelon in the interior of the western border regions could be moved to the border. An interesting question is how many of these 114 divisions started movement to the border under the cover of the calming message of ТАСС (Suvorov is referring to a message from June 13 denying rumors that war with Germany was imminent)? The answer is ALL! From the 12-15 of June the Western Military Districts were issued orders, all divisions stationed in the interior were to move to the State Border.

Suvorov cites the journal "Communist" as his source for the claim that every division of the 1st echelon began movement to the border from the 12th-15th of June. According to Isaev Communist is a decent journal in general but it's simply factually incorrect that the whole 1st echelon began movement to the border from the 12th-15th. Bear with me please because this requires some dry but necessary bean counting. This won't be easy reading for the next few minutes as I'm trying to translate autistic, pedantic Russian into English. Isaev:

For starters it makes sense to sort out which detachments are counted amongst the 56 divisions at the border. The Leningrad district contained 9 Rifle Divisions and one Rifle Brigade, the Baltic Region 9 Rifle Divisions and 1 Brigade, the Special Western Region 12 Rifle Divisions, 1 Tank Division and 1 Cavalry Division, the Kiev District 16 Rifle Divisions, 1 Tank Division, and 1 Cavalry Division, and Odessa Region 5 Rifle Divisions and 1 Cavalry Division. Within these divisions is included the 41st Tank Division of the 22 mechanized Corps, the 22nd Tank Division of the 14th mechanized Corps and the 3rd Cavalry Division in Crimea. Accordingly, the rest of the Divisions of the Mechanized Corps of the border regions are counted among those 114 located 50km and more from the border. None of them went anywhere before the 18th of June. Accordingly when we subtract from the 114 divisions the large sum of 22 tank and 12 motorized divisions we are left with 80 (that subtraction struck as me arbitrary and weird when I first read it but what he means is no division that was formally part of a Mechanized Corps moved anywhere before the 18th therefore we can exclude them outright since Suvorov claimed movement was between the 12thand15t). Left in place in the interior are mechanized troops (who are not organically part of a mechanized corps) and those of the special district, the 17th, 19th, 20th and 24th divisions. These (the 17th, 19th, 20th and 24th) were a cohort of invalids formed in the Spring of 1941 that were low on personal and equipment therefore they didn't move to the border before the war. The 43rd tank division of the 19th mechanized Corps was located in its usual base on the 22nd of June. Amongst the separate detachments of this corps which received no orders to move to the border would be the 9th separate mechanized corps of K.K. Rokossovsky, his corps was also undermanned and under equipped and consequently stayed in place (sorry to keep interjecting, notice Isaev is talking of a formal mechanized corps here therfore he doesn't subtract it from our 80 divisions because he already did so at the outset). If we check for ourselves the claims of the journal "Communist" on which Suvorov bases his claims, we found out that the 6 tank and 3 motorised divisions of the Kiev District are amongst those 114 that stayed put until the start of the war. It's the same with the weak Western Special District formed in spring of 41. Its 6 divisions were spread out over Western and Central Belarus and moved nowhere before the start of the war. Accordingly, we can subtract 15 from our 80 which leaves us 65 (these 15 divisions are not part any mechanized Corps so now Isaev is subtracting them) We can add to this list the 6 rifle divisions formed by the former Baltic Governments. They didn't move anywhere and when the war started they were sent further to the rear leaving us with 59 divisions. The 7th Rifle Corps consisting of 3 rifle divisions only received orders to relocate on the 25th, 3 days after the war started. The 116th Reserve division in Nikolaev didn't move anywhere leaving us with 55 divisions.

Isaev carries on this maddening exercise in autism a bit further, he eventually narrows down the number of divisions that could have moved closer to the border down to 48. 48 is certainly a bit less terrifying and bombshell than the 114 Suvorov was claiming..especially considering the size of the border we are talking about. But 114...48 whatever, Suvorov triumphantly declares in Icebreaker:

In my personal library there are enough documents about the movement of troops to the border that one could write a few thick books about that theme

Isaev in his dry academic style advises:

I would advise to start collecting information about those divisions that didn't move to the borders and compare which category is closer to the number 114.

Isaev further tortures the reader by explaining why so many divisions actually didn't move anywhere before June 18, and why many didn't go anywhere until the war had already started. I don't think it's necessary to go over all that in detail, it all comes down a combination of some divisions not being battle worthy because of manning and equipment shortages, logistical issues, and divisions simply already being where they were assumed to be the most useful should war start in accordance with General Staff plans. That last point is worth maybe emphasizing, we are speaking of divisions that aren't right on the border but at least 50km away but often much further. Yet some were assumed to already be where they would come in handy. There can't be any serious talk of movement of the entire 1st echelon to the border. I have a staggering collection of tinfoil hats but Suvorovs basic claims just don't add up. As a matter of fact, the real number of divisions that relocated farther West and not always right to the border before the 18th was 32 and Isaev individually lists them which isn't necessary for our purposes here. Now 32 is still a huge increase over the previous months 4 but we are even farther from Suvorovs 114 now. Now of course after the 18th there was a much more active build up on the Soviet end, but this was when the Germans were also getting in position to attack and had been doing so for some time.

Regardless of the war being less than a week away Suvorov still in accordance with the demands of his theory assumes even the movements on the 18th and after were conducted to facilitate a secret surprise attack against Germany:

There is a small passage known from a battle order received on the 18th of June by Colonel I.D. Chernohovski, Commander of a Tank Division in the 12th Mechanized corps. It's a pity that the whole order hasn't been made public. It stays secret just like half a century ago. According to documents captured by the Germans their first engagement with the 28th Tank Division (Chernohovskis division) was near Shaulyim, but the divisions task was to move to the border.

Isaev:

That order was secret for 20 years.

That is the order was public for anyone with the inclination to look for it 24 years before Suvorov wrote Icebreaker. I won't reproduce the whole order here for times sake, it's not even that interesting. The one thing in it that's relevant is that it contradicts Suvorovs claims that the secret order was for the 12th Mechanised Corps to move to the border. In fact, the order was for the corps to move to a new base 120km away from the border. Suvorov would have known this if he had actually looked for the information. Did he lie on purpose or was it just sloppy research?

It's not necessary imo to detail the movement of individual Soviet units towards the border as Isaev does between the 13th and the start of hostilities. We have already established that contrary to Suvorovs claims most of the movement didn't start between the 12th-15th as at the time all of 32 out of 170 of the 1st echelons divisions moved anywhere at all and not all these moved directly to the border. Furthermore, not all of them had completed movement when the war finally started. Icebreaker gives a completely distorted description of what actually happened. After the 18th when the mechanized Corps started movement claiming that this was definitely part of a secret plan to attack Germany moves the whole conversation to the realm of total stupidity. For example, by this time the Germans were already in or moving into attack position themselves. I guess the narrative per Icebreaker would be "the Soviets were moving into secret unethical attack positions to attack the Germans on other the side of the border who were in ethical attack positions because the German secret attack was preventive". In essence you can only believe one way or the other based purely on your ideological/emotional preferences. We have seen here already that Suvorov is prone to massively overstating his case, presenting the typical as extraordinary, and at best sloppy scholarship and at worst just lying. Finally now we can get into what I consider the real meat of why it's unlikely that the Soviet Union was about to attack.

Isaev:

If you look at a map of the disposition of Soviet troops at the moment the war started the divisions and corps of the Red Army can be divided into 3 large groups. The first group is located 0-100km from the border, the second group is the "interior" divisions which on June 22 were in the process of moving from positions 200-400km from the border to positions 80-100km from the border. These 2 groups constitute the 1st strategic echelon. The 3rd group is the Army of those districts located more than a few hundred kilometers from the border.

Let's emphasize that the second group of the 1st echelon, the far bigger group btw was in movement when Barbarossa started (or in many cases not moving at all as we have seen) therefore there can be no serious talk of Soviet troops already being in "attack" position. The Germans completed their deployment while the Soviets weren't even close to doing so which explains catastrophe for the Soviets regardless of whatever final disposition Moscow had in mind. Just like with Poland.

Isaev starts getting into the really interesting stuff when he is a addressing another of Suvorov distortions which can't be anything other than intentional, Isaev quoting Icebreaker:

At a meeting near the border the Commander of the 1st strategic echelon spoke to high-ranking guests from the 2nd echelon headed by the Commander of the Moscow Military District General I.V. Tulinev. Using the presence of Tulinev General D.G. Pavlov was explaining to the Commander of the 4th Army General Lieutenant Chukovo the purpose of the Second Strategic echelon. Gazing at Tulinev Pavlov said to Chukovo "when the troops from the inner districts arrive and we have achieved a density of 7.5 kilometres of front per division then we can move forward without doubting success".

Isaev:

Suvorov distorts what was said to the point of being unrecognizable, Pavlovs actual words, "At first we may have to retreat, the Germans are no longer the Army of 100k they had in 1932 but now an Army of 3 million that has over 300 detachments and a large number of aircraft. If the enemy concentrates just 2/3s of their strength on our border before a war than at first we will defend and even have to retreat...but when the troops from the inner districts arrive and we have achieved a density of 7.5 kilometers of front per division we can move forward without doubting our success, isn't it so"?

Saying Suvorov distorted Pavlovs words to the point of being unrecognisable is almost an understatement, Suvorov basically flipped the meaning of what Pavlov said completely. Isaev focuses in on Pavlov discussing troop density and this takes us to another distortion/lie from Suvorov and some of the strongest evidence in Chapter 3 for why the USSR was in all likelihood not about to embark on an imminent invasion of Germany.

Isaev:

Someone familiar with battlefield theory from the 1930s would understand Pavlovs words. He meant that when the war started there would be a 15-20 day period of mobilization, concentration and deployment while the troops near the frontier defend the border and fight to achieve air superiority and disrupt the concentrations and deployments of the enemy.

Pavlov was discussing formal war theory, in practice all Armys tried to get ahead of the game and accomplish concentration, deployment and mobilization before war started as it could be the difference between victory and defeat.

Another case of sloppy scholarship/lying from Suvorov:

7.5 kilometers per division was the standard set by Soviet Generals for attack. At that time the standard for defensive activities was 3-4 times larger.

Isaev:

From where Suvorov took those numbers is a mystery to me, according to ПУ-39 (Field Regulations-39, the equivalent of a US Army Field Manual, ПУ-39 was the Red Armys most up to date at the time) a rifle divisions width of front during offensive operations could vary between 2-6 kilometers.

Isaev quotes a fragment of ПУ-39 directly which is worth reproducing here:

98. Width of front during offensive operations depends on the characteristics of enemy resistance, means of suppressing resistance, and terrain conditions. Width of front may vary in length from 2.5km-3.5km for a division and from 8-12km for a corps.

Nowhere close to what Suvorov was claiming and this has serious implications for his claim that the Red Army was just about to launch a well planned surprise attack.

While attacking a heavily fortified defensive belt width of front can constrict to 2km for a division and 7km for a corps.

As for defense according to ПУ-39:

The width of the front during defense is determined by the width of the front of the shackling group (a shackling group is basically a unit on the very front line during defense, this will be clearer in a second).

A division may defend a section of front 8-12km and in the interior 4-6km

So a division on the front (shackling group) 8-12km and further back into the battle space 4-6km. This is logical in that if the enemy overcomes the first line of defense which often will not be the primary they will then run into even heavier resistance once they have already had to chew through the shackling group, taking losses in the process.

Isaev shows the corresponding numbers for regiments and battalions but this isn't required here. It's enough to show that Suvorovs numbers for both offense and defensive unit concentration are wildly at odds with the Soviet regulations of the time and this imo is where his claims which have already been shown as dubious start to just outright fall apart. Sure, it's a cliche that only squares do it by the book and dashing rouges shoot first and ask questions never. But the idea that the Soviet general staff was planning an imminent attack on Germany when Barbarossa broke out when they didn't have anything close to the required unit density per km of front for offense is just asking to take too much on faith. Sure, if Moscow was feeling extra adventurous and itching to go they very well might bend the rules they just wrote but to take on faith that they would just outright ignore them requires emotional/ideological motivation.

Isaev:

Suvorov also offers a defensive sector of 22.5-30km for a division. This is just fantasy and that's not even touching on what the Red Armys regulations said. Without the 2nd Strategic Echelon the Soviet troops could neither defend nor attack. Why? The problem is exactly one of troop density at the border in accordance with Soviet regulations. On the 720km Baltic border there were 2 Armys, the 8th and 11th with a density of 48km per division.

There you go. The Soviet border was so damn big that it was impossible to achieve the required troop density for attack or defense should war break out with only one strategic echelon. One advantage of such an enormous country is that you have lots of room to retreat should the need arise but also you have tons of border to cover and hypothetically attacks could come from lots of different points along said border. This was especially true before satellites and drones and whatever. Isaev in his usual style bludgeons the reader by providing a long dry list of just how much ground a division actually covered on the Western Border compared to what was written in regulations. Listing them all here isn't entirely necessary but in some cases it was worse and some slightly better than what we saw in the Baltics. For example on the Romanian 650km border there was a grand total of 7 rifle and 2 cavalry divisions on hand. This was bad even by Suvorovs retarded numbers. In Ukraine things were a bit better but still bad as per regulations, 5 Rifle Divisions holding 170km here and 3 rifle divisions holding 130km there. In other words defending the Soviet frontier was fairly difficult during times of low diplomatic stability.

Isaev quotes Suvorov again:

Amongst three exceptionally strong armies one especially stands out, the 9th, it wasn't yet fully manned and equipped but stood like a skyscraper not yet completed but already blocking out the sun. In june of 1941 the 9th was the as yet unfinished skeleton of the strongest army in the world, consisting of 6 corps including 2 mechanized and 1 calvary.

Isaev:

He forgot to mention that this "giant" covered a front of 650km.

Nobody has trouble understanding that the Red Army was big, but also nobody seems to be able to grasp that this big Army was also responsible for covering an even more massive border. A border so long that actually the USSR had fewer divisions per km of front than say Germany or Poland.

Isaev:

If there had been real giants and skyscrapers at the border then the catastrophe of summer of 1941 wouldn't have been unavoidable. The problem is totally the opposite of what Suvorov claims, the density of troops per km at the border was many times less than that recommended even for defense.

Isaev demonstrates this by drawing an analogy with the battle of Kursk. Sadly, number crunching a little bit will be required for a few minutes. As you read over these numbers just don't forget Suvorov is acting like the 9th Army which contained 15 divisions being responsible for covering 650 kilometers is somehow evidence that the USSR was going to attack Germany. Boring I know but let's look at what kind of troop density was actually required to just barely win a set piece defensive battle against Germany.

Isaev:

13th Army of the central front at Kursk. Front of 32km with divisions covering the following kilometers as follows: 15th Rifle-9km, 81st Rifle-10km. 6th Rifle-14km, 307th Rifle-10km, 148th Rifle-7km, 8th Rifle-6km 74th Rifle-14km.

The sum total of what these 7 divisions covered is more than 32km obviously but this is explained by divisions covering overlapping sectors. So 7 divisions covering 32 total km at Kursk, then 3or4 covering 150km on the Western Frontier when Barbarossa broke. 2 of these divisions are covering more ground than was recommended by Soviet Regulation but nowhere near as much as Suvorov tries to pass off as standard. This sample from Kursk that Isaev offers is officers on the ground bending Soviet regulations but not just throwing them out the window like Suvorov would have us think they did while planning a sneak attack. The point here is if the Soviet Army had met the Kursk battle with the same density they did June21st than the Red Army would have been annihilated. I'm not going to list every other Soviet front at Kursks troop density like Isaev does.

Isaev expands on his analogy by discussing what happened to the Voronezh front during the Kursk Campaign. The Voronezh fronts troop density was a bit worse than the 13th Armys which I listed above but not drastically. I mean at least they didn't have single divisions holding 30km like Suvorov was saying was standard Soviet doctrine. Many of Voronezh fronts division were however holding 14or15km which is a bit more than the manuals recommended. Even though Voronezhs Front wasn't the target of a main German thrust at Kursk its line was broken all the same to a depth of 35km. Once more, Voroezh fronts divisions were often covering 13-14km of front. The Soviet divisions that met Barbarossa were often covering dozens on top of not being in fortified positions like the Red Army at Kursk. Voronezh Front was eventually saved by reinforcements arriving from the Step front. Nobody reinforced the Soviet units that were directly in the path of the Germans on the 22nd of June.

Isaev

Its easy to see that the density of troops at the border on June22 1941 was less than at Kursk by an order of magnitude. This is why the forces of the second strategic echelon never arrived

What he means is that the 1st echelon was thoroughly smashed and dispersed so fast that the 2nd echelon couldn't arrive in time to help. Some readers might be asking how this is possible when in raw numbers of troops and equipment the Soviet possessed a considerable edge over Germany. Well this is why I keep repeating that whoever has more of their pieces in place at full strength where and when they are needed when the culling begins is also an enormous factor that's often under appreciated by those who just don't know much about military operations. On June 22 just as with the Polish Campaign it was Germany that accomplished this while the Soviets larger in numerical terms Army was spread out all over the place, often on railroad wagons and consequently highly dispersed divisions and Corps were completely unable to support each other. Imagine a bunch of Indians or Cowboys herding a large number of rabid and dangerous but totally confused and disoriented beasts. The most horrific defeats where the Red Army suffered the most losses were around Kiev, Minsk and Smolensk, that is not literally right on the border. This was a consequence of the numerically superior but uncoordinated and constantly on the back foot Red Army units being herded into these death trap cauldrons. And forgive me but one more time....the Red Army was on the back foot and reeling because Germany started the war in a much better starting position which more than made up for a marked numerically inferiority. The mechanics of how this happened indicate nothing about whether the Red Army intended to launch a surprise attack or whether they intended to defend, either way due to the relative starting positions of the 2 Armies it all would have ended up the same.

Isaev:

The Red Armys problem in 1941 wasn't that it was preparing to go on the offensive. Whether it was preparing for offense or defense the outcome was forgone as neither defensive or offensive groupings managed to come together just like with Poland on the 1st of September.

Imagine that the defending troops on the Southern end of the Kursk salient met the German thrust in a different condition than they actually did in July of 1943. Let's say they were minus a few armies, such as the 7th Guards of M.S. Shumilov from the Volga military district and the 5th Guards Army of A.S. Zhadov and the 5th Guards Tank Army of P.A. Rotmistrov are just preparing for transit via railway. The 6th Guards Army of the Voronezh Front now defends 134km instead of 64 due to the absence of the 7th Guards. Overall Troops density is now reduced by 50%. If the Germans had broken Voronezhs front under such conditions than only a counter attack by Zhadov or Rotmistrov would have even the slightest chance of saving the day but they are just now preparing to load onto trains. Just as happened in reality under more ideal conditions Voronezhs front which was thoroughly prepared over the course of months has been penetrated to a depth of 35km. What do we want from the troops of the Western front in 1941 who met the Germans with even less troop density than Voronezh Front in July 1943 in our thought exercise?

Now I know what some stubborn critics are thinking. Kursk was a deliberate defensive battle on the Soviet end so it has no relevance at all because Germany attacked Soviet troops in attack positions in June of 1941. Let me say up front that it's not my intention to sound condescending here but I just know that I have to spell this out for the especially indigent. As we have already demonstrated, troops in attack positions are even more densely packed than troops on the defense. On June22 1941 the Red Armys troop density was not even close to being adequate even for defense due to its many Corps, Divisions etc being strung out over thousands of kilometers and often being on rail roads. Obviously if troop density was far too low even for defense there can be no talk of the Red Army being in attack position.

If the Red Army had been in attack positions then a bunch of very dense formations would have presumably been surrounded right on the border. That's not what happened, in reality a bunch of far flung formations absolutely unable to either defend or attack due to inability to mutually support each other were herded into cauldrons well inside the Western Frontier and annihilated.

What makes Isaevs Kursk battle analogue relevant is that it shows that had just one Soviet piece not been in place and 2 not on time then the outcome would have been radically different and at Kursk the Soviets had been preparing for months. None the less the Soviets won that battle by the skin of their teeth.

Imagine if you will that you personally come across a platoon of dead soldiers on some battlefield somewhere. Amongst the soldiers corpses you notice a few whose rifle magazines are loaded with crayons. Half the dead soldiers have pictures on their phones of them partying and drinking a few hours before they were killed in battle. The platoons lieutenant has headphones in his ears and on closer inspection you realize the headphones aren't connected to a radio to HQ but he was listening to Bronze Age Pervert owning resentful anti Zionist by comparing them to BLM when he was mowed down. As a matter of fact, the Platoon RTOs (radio telephone operator) rucksack doesn't even have a radio in it but a slip and slide. For some reason the Platoons forward observer was wearing roller skates instead of normal boots when he took a 50cal round to the eye. The slain Platoon Sergeant appeared to be in the middle of ordering Chinese take out when he lost his head to a 40mm grenade. Also, the only reason you found this dead platoon was because they were at the wide-open floor of a valley surrounded by forested hills on all sides. Deeply shaken by what you have seen you leave the valley and go to the gate of the nearest Army base. The guard calls HQ and eventually the Captain whose Company the slain Platoon belonged to comes to speak with you. You tell him what you have found and he says "Oy Vey I was planning on attacking with those guys eventually". You ask the Captain why nobody went to help the Platoon and he says "well you know it was yom kippur last week so the rest of my guys were on leave. They should all be arriving for duty again tomorrow".

You go home and tell your wife about this whole crazy day and she says "hmmmmm the Captain said he wanted to attack with those guys eventually right"? You confirm that yes the captain said that. "And all the rest of his men went home for Yom Kippur but they will arrive back tomorrow...that's why nobody reinforced that poor Platoon right"? You confirm yes the Captain also said that. Your wife triumphantly declares "I know why that Platoon lost the battle and was wiped out!!! They were seconds away from attacking someone who attacked them in self defense"!!!

Okay we are fortunately approaching the end of this installment. Unfortunately, there is one last round of bean counting necessary. Isaev goes through the entire damn relevant operational space for the opening day of Barbarossa and shows that on day 1 the Germans had marked local numerical superiority over the Soviets. That is the Germans ensured that when the opening engagements went down that they had the most men on hand.

I won't torment my respected fellow Stalkers by reproducing Isaevs entire list as a few examples should suffice. Isaev:

On a front from Peremishlya to Pripyit on the Soviet side directly on the border were located from North to South the 45th-Rifle, 62nd-Rifle, 87th-Rifle, 124th-Rifle, 3rd-Calvary, 159th-Rifle, 97th-Rifle, 99th Rifle and 3rd Tank Divisions. On the German side opposite the Soviets on the morning of the 22nd June the 56th Infantry, 62nd Infantry. 298th Infantry, 44th Infantry, 168th Infantry, 299th Infantry, 111th Infantry, 75th Infantry, 57th Infantry, 297th Infantry, 9th Infantry, 262nd Infantry, 24th Infantry, 295th Infantry, 71st Infantry, 1st Mountain, 68th Infantry, 257th Infantry, 101st Infantry. Closet of all to the Soviet border specifically were the 11th Panzer, 13th Panzer, 14th Panzer and 25th Motorized. In total 18 Infantry, 1 Mountain, 3 Panzer and 1 Motorized division VS 8 Soviet Rifle, 1 Tank and 1 Cavalry Division.

In the direction of the main thrust along the Sokalkski ledge against the 87th and 124th Soviet Divisions of the 5th Army were opposed 6 German divisions, 298th, 44th, 168th, 299th ,111th, 75th and 57th. That is at the location of the main point of effort the Germans had established 3-1 superiority in their favor. To imagine that 8 Soviet Rifle Divisions were to serve as a fist against 17 German Infantry Divisions and 1 Light Infantry Division isn't realistic.

As I have said ad nauseum by now the Soviet units directly on the border were SoL and nobody was coming to help and the reason wasn't because the Soviets were in attack positions. At this point the Germans were also in attack position and they could call on help if need be because there were a lot more Germans where the opening engagements were popping off, especially at the main thrust. My intent is not to strawman here. It's beyond the scope of this article to prove Suvorovs thesis false in its entirety with this one already long essay. But we can put to rest the claim that the catastrophe that engulfed the USSR on June22 1941 was because the Army was literally just about to attack. That the Soviets were hypothetically getting ready to attack at some vague point in the future likewise can't be proven or disproven based purely on the mechanics of the catastrophe regardless of Suvorov trying to do so.

Isaev:

If the 31st Rifle Corps had moved to the border a bit earlier the balance of forces between Germany and the USSR standing immediately on the border wouldn't have been so lopsided in Germanys favor. Moving the 31st Corps to the border was of urgent necessity to secure it and calling it a sign of aggressive intent as does Suvorov can only be done by someone who never carefully looked at a map of the mutual dispositions of Soviet and German troops at the border

Remember, we met the 31st Corps at the beginning of this review when Suvorov was citing its discrete movement to the border as evidence that the USSR was planning a sneak attack against Germany. In actuality it was the fact that the USSR started movement to the border so late that doomed them on June22 1941. Unfortunately for the Soviet troops in the direct line of fire at Sokalkski Ledge on the 1st day of Barbarossa 31st Corps despite already having received orders to move closer to the was still too far away to help. I’m not going reproduce here Isaevs long list detailing the specific troop dispositions at the border, what I already showed is the general rule. At the border the Germans had local numerical superiority. Let’s try and move closer to the end of this installment:

Isaev:

At the most important points on the border the concentration of Soviet troops was so low that it required backfilling at the expense of the armies in the interior districts and Second Strategic Echelon.

Simple as.

Isaev quoting Suvorov saying something with some truth to it:

When we speak of the reasons for the defeat of the Red Army in the opening period of the war we for some reason forget the main one, the Red Army was located in Train Wagons.

Isaev:

I want to expand on this thesis, it's not so much that Red Army was in wagons as these wagons didn't go where they needed to go. Just like what happened to Poland in 1939.

Yes, once the war starts the trains that started moving in peacetime are going to be bombed and strafed, stations are going to need to be changed, these delays mean troops that need help won't receive it and then you have final destinations no longer being relevant. Then troops on trains in the middle of nowhere end up isolated because on one end the Germans have already overrun the final destination and on the other is a cluster fuck traffic jam etc etc. Ohhh Lord if only Russia would hit the Ukrainian rail network today. What could be. I'm serious, Ukraine’s railways operate like its peace time today. So actually, Russia could do a Barbarossa against the Ukrainian rail network in theory. But whether the troops were on trains going to attack positions or going to shore up the abysmally undermined border armies can't be proven either way. It's seriously dumb to even debate about it based on the movement in question alone.

Isaev spends a few more pages dealing with Suvorovs implication that the Soviet Union was trying to hide that it had lots of tanks by assigning tank units to divisions and corps that weren't formally designated tank or mechanized corps. After the war started the USSR always called armies with lots of tanks shock armies according to Suvorov. Since this practice only arose after the war started according to him it means the USSR was trying to trick the Germans into thinking that they weren't assembling an unethical surprise attack army with lots of tanks.. because if the USSR wasn't trying to hide an upcoming surprise attack they would have called any army with tanks a Shock Army.

Isaev:

So according to Suvorov the indicator of a Shock Army is the presence of any tanks whatsoever.

Isaev owns Suvorov by showing examples of shock armies that didn't have any tanks and reproducing that isn't necessary here and I really want to wrap this up. However, Isaev does go straight to the old Soviet Manuals to show what the criteria for a shock army actually was. What constituted a Shock Army as per the Soviet manual from 1933 literally entitled Shock Army:

The first task of the shock army is to deliver irresistible frontal strikes to the tactical defenses of the enemy. Fulfilling this task falls on the tactical break through echelons of reinforced Rifle corps. The number of these Rifle Corps is determined by the width of the front to be broken through with a minimum width of 30km, otherwise the threat of being squeezed into an artillery fire pincer can arise. The front of attack for one Rifle Corps of 3 divisions during attack on prepared enemy fortifications should not exceed 10km

In the end Suvorov owned himself.

Isaev:

As we see a shock army is an army that contains a certain amount of rifle corps. This is logical because the "shockness" of an army lies in its ability to overcome the defenses of an enemy using rifle divisions and corps.

Nothing about tanks. It's actually ridiculous how off Suvorov was in this case. Both German blitzkrieg and Soviet deep battle dictated that the Armies or Army Groups in Germanys case doing the initial immediate breakthrough would be extremely infantry heavy and once the penetration is made then comes the tanks and mechanized infantry to exploit the gap. I mean how much sense does it make to bash your mobile tanks and Motorized infantry against prepared enemy fortifications and then should a breakthrough be made send in your much slower moving infantry? I think Suvorov knew all this and he was just throwing whatever dumb shit he could think of at the wall and assumed some would stick.

Isaev then shows that as per what was written in the Soviet manual literally entitled Shock Army that not a single border Army or Army in the second strategic echelon met the criteria of being called a Shock Army.

Isaev:

NOT ONE of the Armies of the border or inner districts met the criteria of being a Shock Army. Lets list them in order, number of Rifle Division in parentheses. 25th (5) 8th (5) 11th (8) 3rd (3) 10th (6) 4th (4) 5th (5) 6th (6) 26th (3) 12th (3) 9th (6 plus one mountain)

Remember the Soviet manual stated that when attacking prepared enemy positions that a Corps of 3 rifle divisions shouldn't have a front wider than 10km but also the bare minimum required breakthrough for a shock army is 30km. Given the exceedingly low number of infantry in these prewar Armies Isaev is right none of them would qualify. That's another indicator imo that the Soviet Union wasn't planning a surprise attack anytime in the near future after June22. Presumably they would have wanted some shock armies on hand if they were.

Alright that's enough I think. I'm not under the illusion that this wall text alone was enough to change the mind of anyone totally sold on the Icebreaker thesis but at the minimum Isaev proves in this chapter that it's literally impossible for Soviet troops to have already been in attack positions because attack requires density and that's exactly what wasn't present anywhere on the border or interior. Furthermore, even Suvorov said the main reason for the Soviet Unions crushing defeat was that the Red Army was in trains heading West...presumably heading to attack positions. But if the trains had got rolling earlier there likely would have been no crushing defeat and where would that leave Suvorovs theory? So one way or another, either for attack or defense the Soviet Union desperately needed more troops at the border. We have even seen here that real mass movement of Soviet troops didn't even start until about a week before Barbarossa. The USSR stepped on the same rake as Poland. The only thing a Russophile can say in regard to that is why the hell did Stalin wait so long? The troops should have been sent West way earlier.

We've also noted that moving troops into position for a prospective war in peacetime was normal practice as was low key mobilization. Wagging your finger at the USSR alone for doing this because of "communism and Stalin" or whatever is the cringest sort of moralitarian pearl clutching. To top it all off it was actually Germany that did this the best and the result was they smashed Poland and reached the gates of Moscow so any berating of the USSR on the part of Western Rightwingers on account of it's much less successful and thorough pre war movement and mobilization indicates a total lack of self awareness or feminine reasoning based purely on emotional needs.

Like always thanks to those that gave me and Isaev a fair hearing. This is an especially prickly topic amongst dissident Western types so I sincerely appreciate those Stalkers at least willing to entertain me here. There's a ton more to this topic like I mentioned in the opening and I would be happy to cover some of that as well if the readers are interested.....assuming this humble blog actually attracts any readers anytime soon.

Until next time stay frosty out there and don't forget the Patriots are in control.