The following abbreviations are used in the article: IN - military district, GSh - General base, DVF - Far Eastern Front, ZabVO - Transbaikal VO, ZAPOVO - Western special VO, CA - Red Army, KOVO - Kiev special VO, md - motorized division, NGOs - People's Commissariat of Defense, ODVO - Odessa VO, PribOVO - Baltic special VO, RM - intelligence materials, RU - intelligence department of the General Staff, sd - rifle division, td - a tank division.
In the previous part, it was shown that the leadership of our country knew about the inevitability of a war with Germany, but believed that the beginning of the war would be associated with the outcome of future negotiations, during which ultimatum demands could be presented. Intelligence reported this to the leadership.
The Second World War deviated from the developed scenario, and the Americans became worried. It was necessary to somehow change the course of the war, so as not to be left alone against the unpredictable Hitler. To somehow help England, after which it would be the turn of the United States. This could have been achieved with the help of the Soviet Union.
At the end of May, the American president said: the USSR was suitable for the role of a country to which, in the event of a war with Hitler, the United States could provide all-round assistance.
According to the incoming RM, the German grouping in Romania in May increased sharply. Probably, to counter this threat, the 34th Rifle Corps began to be transferred from the North Caucasus Military District. The 25th Rifle Corps was redeployed to the border between KOVO and Kharkov VO in the camps.
67 rifle divisions, contained in the 4/120 state, took on training camps of 6,000 assigned personnel for the deployment of 18 rifle companies out of 27 available in the formations. These divisions were not fully provided with transport and were of limited mobility. However, the divisions did not need mobility, since the training of the assigned personnel was planned to be carried out in permanent camps.
For a long time, Stalin's reaction to the preparations for the war in Germany in 1941 has been viewed from the point of view of the memoirs of military leaders. Many of these memoirs were based on the memoirs of G. K. Zhukov, who on the eve of the war was the head of the General Staff. Therefore, he had to know a lot about the pre-war period.
Let's consider several episodes from the memoirs of Marshal G. K. Zhukov.
Increase in the number of divisions in the western districts
The first episode concerns the training camp in 1941. This issue has already been discussed in the previous two parts.
G. K. Zhukov
I asked [S. K. Timoshenko - approx. Auth.] once again report to the government and at the same time ask for permission to call in the assigned personnel from the reserve in order to bring parts of the border military units into a combat-ready state …
Once … Stalin asked how the conscription of the assigned personnel from the reserve was going. The People's Commissar of Defense replied that the conscription of the reserve was proceeding normally, the enlistment staff would be in the border districts at the end of April. At the beginning of May, his retraining will begin in units …
For training camps in 1941, the enrolled staff was to be involved in the amount determined by applications from the districts. Nobody was going to cancel the training camp in 1941. The Defense Drug Commander was only told that it was necessary to reduce the number of people involved in training camps. The People's Commissar of Defense could not or did not begin to justify the need for a larger composition in the government.
The enlistment staff at the end of April was not called up for training in the border districts. In the border districts in May, training began in 41% of the divisions, which were supposed to receive the assigned personnel. The training camp in the internal districts was planned to be held in June, of which in three divisions - in July.
It can be stated:
- The General Staff was removed from the distribution of the enrolled staff, called up for training, by districts;
- The General Staff agreed that 28% of the personnel involved in the training were called up for training in the rifle and mountain rifle divisions of the border districts;
- The General Staff did not object to the fact that some divisions of the western districts did not participate in the training camp.
For example, in the ZAPOVO, they called for training in 4 rifle divisions out of 24 located in the district. In KOVO, appointees were called in 26 rifle and mountain rifle divisions out of 32, and in OdVO - in 4 out of 8. In PribOVO, the enrolled personnel began to arrive for training somewhere from 20 June.
On June 1, 1941, the average staffing of rifle divisions in the western districts was ("History of the Second World War 1941-1945"): PribOVO - 8 712 people, ZAPOVO - 9 327, KOVO - 8 792 and OdVO - 8 400.
In the rifle divisions of the state 4/100 (staffing 10,291 people), 1,900 registrants were called up, increasing its composition to 12,191 people. In the 4/120 state division (staffing of 5,864 people), 6,000 scribes were called up, increasing its composition to 11,864 people. In the mountain rifle divisions (staffing 8,829 people) KOVO was called up: in five - 1,100 people and in one - 2,000.
If the KA leadership was expecting a war and wanted to increase the number of rifle divisions to about 12,000 people in the western districts, and mountain rifle divisions to 11,000, then it was necessary to additionally call for training in the western districts of 138,559 appointees or redistribute them from the inner districts.
It can be seen that the OdVO turned out to be the most prepared in this regard. Most likely, the credit for this belongs to the chief of staff of the district V. M. Zakharov.
Also, it was additionally required to mobilize a large number of horses and cars in the national economy. It took 20-30 days for the staffing and combat coordination of the rifle divisions of the 4/120 state according to mob plans. Therefore, by the beginning of the war, 67 such divisions were of limited mobility. The personnel of not all divisions was fully prepared and did not go through combat coordination.
In the "Strategic Sketch of the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945." said:
It was quite obvious that with the sudden start of the war, the mobilization of the formations located on the border would fail. These troops will enter the battle not mobilized and, therefore, not in full combat readiness.
However, this important point was not taken into account in the plan.
Especially unrealistic in this case was the planned deployment of army and front-line communications units, engineering troops, units and institutions of the rear, as well as providing cover armies with personnel, motor transport, artillery traction means (tractors), repair trains and other equipment necessary from the first minutes of the battle. …
The General Staff were obliged to understand all this, but in the end a tragedy happened.
The only reasonable explanation for it is that on the eve of the war, there was in the minds of the army leadership a firm belief in the possibility of deploying formations within the time frame on the basis of which mobilization plans were prepared for them.
It should be noted that Stalin was not involved in this.
Together with the government, he only agreed on the number of enrolled personnel involved in the training camp. He did not define how this composition will be distributed among the constituencies. He did not establish the volume of troops (including artillery and anti-aircraft artillery units) sent to the camps. He did not redistribute personnel and equipment between the many formed formations. He did not record what and where of the units needed to be transferred in peacetime. However, the army was accused of being unprepared …
Summing up, we can say that the information about the concern of the chief of the General Staff about the call of the assigned personnel to bring the western border districts into a combat-ready state is unreliable.
Redeployment of troops from internal districts
G. K. Zhukov wrote about the redeployment of troops from the internal districts:
It should be noted that until June 10, according to the directives of the General Staff, the 16th Army was not supposed to be sent to the territory of KOVO.
Until June 12, the 21st and 22nd armies did not move out of their deployment points.
With the advancement of the 25th Rifle Corps, there is some kind of confusion in the memoirs.
The 19th Army was partially concentrated on the territory of KOVO. The probable reason for her concentration was discussed at the end of the previous part.
Another 11 rifle divisions were sent to the western districts to disband.
We can say that the episode presented also contains incorrect information about the transfer of 28 rifle divisions from the internal districts in May. Even taking into account the 11 divisions sent to disband …
Stalin is against putting troops on alert
Let us consider an episode from the memoirs of G. K. Zhukov, which describes Stalin's reaction to the proposal of the military: to bring the troops of the border districts on alert.
The text contains details with the date of the conversation. Below is a list of people who have visited Stalin's office since June 14. The previous appointment was on June 11th.
Until June 18, the People's Commissar of Defense and the Chief of the General Staff did not appear in Stalin's office.
On June 17, NF Vatutin and the People's Commissar of Railways LM Kaganovich were present in the office simultaneously with Stalin and VM Molotov. It seems that the conference was reporting on military transport from the inner districts to the west.
So, maybe there was no such conversation? Perhaps this is a deliberate distortion of information?
And what is it for?
For example, to show war veterans and descendants that the KA leadership foresaw everything in advance and tried to avoid a catastrophe on the border, but the stubborn tyrant did not allow this to be done? In this case, it will be clear to everyone that the dead Stalin alone is to blame for the frontier catastrophe on June 22. Therefore, for huge losses and the defeat of border groupings, the demand is only from him …
Could the military have raised the issue of bringing the troops of the western districts to combat readiness on June 18?
We will consider this issue later, when the story comes to this date.
How adequate was Stalin?
Using the mechanized corps as an example, I propose to consider the issue of Stalin's sanity for those people whose opinion may differ from his vision.
In 1939, the spacecraft had four tank corps. When the corps were brought into the territory of Western Belarus and Western Ukraine, their command faced certain problems: the difficulty of management, the cumbersome organization and the complexity of material support.
1939-21-11 at the Main Military Council of the spacecraft discussed the issue of disbanding the tank corps.
K. E. Voroshilov, B. M. Shaposhnikov and G. I. Kulik were in favor of disbandment, while S. M. Budyonny and E. A. Shchadenko opposed. DG Pavlov did not vote, and SK Timoshenko suggested revising their organizational and staff structure. By a majority vote, it was decided to reorganize the corps into four motorized divisions.
In May 1940, German troops showed what large mobile groups are capable of. In RM, an analysis was carried out of the use of German tank groupings in the war in Poland and in the West. Stalin carefully familiarized himself with all incoming RM and once had to take an interest in our large mobile groups.
Nobody from the General Staff addressed Stalin with proposals for the creation of tank or mechanized corps. This is understandable, because only six months ago the military decided that such corps were ineffective. In his memoirs, Marshal V. M. Zakharov wrote about how the issue of creating mechanized corps was solved.
At the end of May 1940, Stalin asked the chief of the General Staff B. M. Shaposhnikov and his 1st deputy I. V. Smorodinov:
“Why are there no mechanized and tank corps in our army?
After all, the experience of the war of the German fascist army in Poland and in the West shows their value in battle.
We need to immediately consider this issue and form several corps in which there would be 1000-1200 tanks …"
M. V. Zakharov drew the attention of I. V. Smorodinov that
we have the developed staffs of the mechanized corps [meaning the staffs of the previously existing corps - approx. auth.]. This should have been reported to Stalin and asked for his permission, based on the calculations and the plan for the receipt of tanks from the industry, to re-form the mechanized corps in relation to the previously existing staff structure, in which it may be advisable to make only some changes.
I. V. Smorodinov replied that he could not discuss this issue, since he had received instructions from Stalin - to have a mechanized corps in the composition of two tank and one motorized divisions, and in tank regiments to have at least 200 tanks …
The problem was that in an unexpected conversation with Stalin, the leadership of the General Staff was not ready to discuss this issue. It was also not ready to re-raise the discussion of this issue with Stalin in order to determine the most optimal structure of the corps. As a result, with the tacit approval or disagreement of the SC leadership, cumbersome and difficult to control mechanized corps were adopted.
Somewhere at the end of December 1940 - in January 1941, the General Staff presented to Stalin a document on the additional formation of about 10 mechanized corps. This document was approved by Stalin with some amendments. The appointed new chief of the General Staff G. K. Zhukov doubled this number.
Stalin summoned KA Meretskov and asked about his opinion on the increase in the number of corps being formed. Later, perhaps, he consulted with someone else and spoke with Zhukov. By March or early March, Stalin agreed with the point of view of G. K. Zhukov.
It turns out that Stalin takes into account the information with which he may not agree, consults with experts, thinks and then makes a decision. That is, he is a sane and thinking leader.
The People's Commissar of Defense and the Chief of the General Staff substantiated to him the February plan for the deployment of spacecraft troops in case of war - and Stalin agreed with him. The military insisted on the deployment of all formations in peacetime - Stalin agreed with them. Stalin is not a professional soldier, and therefore the leadership of the army was obliged to submit their expert opinions to him.
Above, the work "Strategic sketch of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945" was already mentioned, which was prepared at a time when Marshal MV Zakharov was the chief of the General Staff. The chief of the General Staff carefully studied a lot of documents, he had his own opinion, which, perhaps, was reflected in the essay.
Acquaintance with the documents of M. V. Zakharov is confirmed by the historian S. L. Chekunov:
Most of all I used the archive of General Staff G. K. Zhukov (I watched it personally). In second place is M. V. Zakharov (and for him it was mainly his subordinates who watched) …
The essay says:
The fact that the main force of the ground forces may not be ready for the start of the war in the spring-summer of 1941, the leaders of the spacecraft are obliged were to inform Stalin. But they seem to have gotten so caught up in army reform and military planning that they only expected war sometime in 1942. But Stalin is not to blame for this …
In April 1941, the SC leaders wanted to form 10 anti-tank artillery brigades and five airborne corps - and Stalin agreed with them.
The army leadership took all military planning into their own hands, and it is very likely that Stalin trusted this leadership too much. He did not have independent experts …
What was important for the country's defense capability denied by the country's military leadership in the spring of 1941?
It can only be said that, to please the new anti-tank brigades and airborne corps, Stalin did not allow the army to be increased even more. Therefore, the military had to sacrifice eleven rifle divisions. In this case, he only played down the military's appetites. To Stalin, no one was able to prove on figures that the war could start in June …
Redeployment of the 16th Army
On April 13, a non-aggression pact was signed with Japan, which was ratified on April 25. The situation on the Far Eastern borders began to appear to the army leadership more calm. On April 26, several directives were sent from the General Staff on the redeployment of formations from various districts.
The 211st and 212nd Airborne Brigades, as well as the command of the 31st Rifle Corps, are to go west from the Far East Fleet. It was necessary to prepare the 21st and 66th rifle divisions for dispatch to the west from the Far Eastern Division, and from the ZabVO the 16th army as part of the 5th mechanized corps (13th and 17th TD, 109th MD) and 32nd infantry buildings (46th and 152nd rifle divisions). The dispatch should have been made on additional instructions. However, it was not planned to attract the assigned personnel for training camps at the Far Eastern Fleet and in the ZabVO in 1941.
A logical question arises: "How many were the 21st, 66th, 46th and 152nd divisions if they were planned to be sent to the west?"
The rifle divisions of the Far Eastern Front were kept on a staff of 4/100. Until recently, the author only knew about the rifle divisions of the ZabVO that they were held in peaceful states. But there were two peaceful states: 4/100 (10,291 people) and 4/120 (5,864 people).
Which of them contained the ZabVO divisions?
This issue is clarified by the directive of the General Staff, directed on June 7, 1941 to the ZabVO:
The People's Commissar for Defense ordered:
1. To call for 45-day training camps assigned to combat units from the resources of the Ural Military District, junior commanding officers and rank-and-file personnel and organize their training at 93, 114, 65 and 94 rifle divisions, 1,000 (people) of junior command personnel and 5,250 privates each.
2. Summon for 60-day training camps all command and control personnel assigned to combat units, sending them to their units.
3. Horses and mechanical transport from the national economy should not be attracted for fees …
In each of the four remaining rifle divisions of the ZabVO it was required to attract 6,250 junior command personnel and privates. Consequently, these divisions were kept on a staff of 4/120, and after the arrival of the assignees, they should have reached the number of 12,110 people.
Since there are 18 rifle companies deployed in each division, the command personnel (commanders and deputy companies, platoon commanders and political workers) are also called up. With the conscripted command personnel, the number of divisions will be somewhat larger. Horses and mechanized transport are not involved in the training camp, since the divisions will be in their permanent camps.
The figure below shows the deployment of the ZabVO rifle divisions before the start of the war (152nd Rifle Division - before it was sent). It can be seen that the 65th and 152nd rifle divisions are located closest to the Manchurian border.
Since the 65th division was contained in the 4/120 state, the 152nd rifle division had to be kept in the same state. According to a single state for rifle divisions, the 46th rifle division was to be contained in the district, located quite far from the border.
Thus, the two rifle divisions, which, if necessary, should have been sent to the west, had personnel in the amount of 5,864 people, did not have 2/3 of the rifle companies required by the state and the 10,000-strong transport for the division.
Why should this inferior division be advanced several thousand kilometers away?
An article about the promotion of the 16th Army was presented on the Voennoye Obozreniye website. In the 1st and 2nd parts of this article, the RM was considered, which spoke about the preparation of German actions against Turkey, Syria, Iraq and our southern borders.
In early May, units of the 16th Army began to talk about the redeployment of divisions to the west.
For example, in the 333rd artillery regiment of the 152nd SD, on May 3, the command staff was announced to be redeployed to the west. Consequently, they did not make a special secret of this, since, if necessary, it was planned to send the 16th army to the Voronezh region. And this would not be anything special. After all, two airborne brigades, a rifle corps department and eleven rifle divisions, staffed entirely with the Far Eastern Front, from the Siberian, Ural, Moscow, North Caucasian, Kharkov, Volga and Oryol VOs have already been sent to the western districts. The redeployment to the territory of KOVO was started and was being prepared for up to 5-6 divisions. Therefore, the leadership of the spacecraft did not give a damn about the opinion of the German command about the transportation of five more divisions to the Oryol VO. After all, this is not a withdrawal of connections to the state border, or even a withdrawal to border districts.
On May 25, a directive came in on the urgent redeployment of the 16th army as part of the 5th mechanized corps and the 32nd rifle corps. At this time, the commander of the district is in the disposition of the troops of the 16th Army. The commanders of the troops of the district and the 16th Army were literally pulled out of the railway carriage, and they went by plane to the headquarters of the ZabVO. Nobody at the district headquarters knew the destination station for the 16th Army.
In the memoirs of A. A. Lobachev, a member of the military council of the 16th Army (Deputy Chief of the General Staff V. D. Sokolovsky told him about this), A. I.), the commander of the 16th army M. F. Lukin, who told his daughter about this, the 16th army was sent to the Transcaucasus at the Soviet-Iranian border.
The historian A. V. Isaev also speaks about this:"
According to M. F. Lukin, he worked in the General Staff in the strictest secrecy. There he met the commander of the Ural District (the future 22nd Army), which was supposed to be his left neighbor (across the Caspian Sea) during an operation in Iran.
One may or may not believe in what has been said above, but as confirmation of this there are some indirect facts.
1. One commander, MF Lukin, was summoned from the entire 16th Army to the General Staff. On June 4, a member of the military council of the 16th Army left for the NCO (probably the Main Political Directorate of the KA).
At the end of May, the commander of the 57th TD, V. A. Mishulin, was informed that his division was called a separate division. Upon his arrival at the ZabVO headquarters, the district commander informs him that he should report to the General Staff.
The General Staff summons the commander of an army, which has two corps, five divisions and the only commander of a separate tank division. The commander of the ZabVO also met only with the commander and a member of the military council of the 16th army and the commander of the 57th separate tank division.
The conclusion suggests itself that the 16th Army and the 57th Separate Panzer Division should have had different tasks and operate in different directions.
The 16th Army had a mechanized corps, and there were no good tanks in the Central Asian District, where it was planned to transfer units of the 22nd Army. There were tanks with a limited resource, which were previously intensively used in exercises.
This is probably why they decided to transfer the 57th division to reinforce the army's troops from the Urals.
In the conditions of the supposedly impending danger of war, 50 relatively modern high-speed BT-7m tanks are being transferred from the Moscow Military District to the Central Asian District by June 1, of which 9 were radio-equipped.
2. The route of transportation through Central Asia (on a single-track road), although the Transib (two-track road) is not loaded with military traffic. And it was along the Transib that part of the troops with the Far Eastern Front left.
After changing the destination of the 16th Army (June 9-10), part of the echelons from Novosibirsk were sent to Voronezh along the Transib. Therefore, some echelons with the headquarters of the 109th motorized division, units of the 381st and 602nd motorized regiments disembarked at the Berdichev station on June 18, ahead of the tank units that were sent at the end of May.
3. Probably, the operation itself was planned swiftly, and therefore rifle divisions were not required at the initial stage. In this direction in the Transcaucasian district there were two mountain rifle and cavalry divisions. Rifle divisions from Transbaikalia could be needed later, when it would be required to protect objects, communications and the Turkish border.
Therefore, from the ZabVO with a mechanized corps, one 152nd rifle division is sent - the only one of all the divisions transferred to the west in May-June, with a personnel strength of less than 6,000 people. The second division (46th rifle division) is not being transferred from Transbaikalia. On June 22, she is in Irkutsk, raises her assigned staff and from June 27 begins redeployment to the west.
Therefore, the 21st and 66th Rifle Divisions from the Far Eastern Front, ready for dispatch, are also not transferred anywhere, but remain at the points of permanent deployment.21st Rifle Division will begin redeploying westward only on September 11, and 66th Division will be in the Far East until the end of the war.
Therefore, rifle divisions from the North Caucasus Military District are not planned to be transferred to Transcaucasia.
In May-June 1941, 3,816 civilians were mobilized to be sent to Iran in the Azerbaijan SSR: 82 party workers, 100 employees of Soviet organizations, 200 employees of security agencies, 400 police officers, 70 prosecutors, 90 judges and 150 workers of printing houses, etc. … The heads of the subcommittees and the head of the commission have been appointed.
In early June, the entire staff of the reconnaissance and sabotage school, including instructors, was abandoned on the territory of Iran. Perhaps to ensure the entry of troops.
4. At the end of May, exercises are being held in the Transcaucasian VO, of which it is only known that. The commander of the district, General Kozlov, was summoned to Moscow at almost the same time as General Lukin. On June 13-17, the second exercises are held in the Transcaucasian District, the topic of which is unknown.
Exercises are held in the Central Asian District at the beginning of June. It is very similar to preliminary training for the concentration of the army from the Urals.
After the re-targeting of armies from south to west, the leaders of the Transcaucasian and Central Asian districts continue to develop a kind of secret operation.
S. L. Chekunov noted:
For your information … I inform you that the cases of operational planning in the West and the East on the eve of the war were all declassified, a couple of cases in the South (SAVO and ZakVO) and a couple of cases for 1937-1940 remained in secret storage. And yes, there is something else in the Moremans …
This means that there are some points that are still too early to reveal on operational planning in the south …
5. In early June, the speed of the 16th Army's echelons slowed down. Long stops appeared at large railway stations. The personnel were allowed to walk and were washed.
Historian S. L. Chekunov:
At the beginning of June, our people, in general, did not understand what was happening …
That is why it was the ninth who saw the light - it is not clear. However, it is absolutely certain that until the evening of June 9, the option of a war with Germany was not considered as upcoming events …
During two evening meetings on June 9, decisions were made to start the main deployment …
The 16th Army is redeployed to the Oryol Military District and only on June 10 a decision is made to redeploy it to KOVO …
Historian A. V. Isaev: [16th Army - approx. auth.]
How the German troops were supposed to advance
In the area of 1941-15-05, a note was prepared by the People's Commissar of Defense and Chief of the General Staff to the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR I. V.
On July 30, 2021, a meeting of the Russian Historical Society was held. In the foyer, the "Diagram of the balance of forces" and the "Diagram of the deployment of the strategic forces of the USSR" were exhibited. One of the schemes got into the media.
The quality of the photograph does not allow us to see the inscriptions concerning the German groups. However, information on these groupings can only be based on the RM RU of 1941-15-05, as this is stated in the textual part of the document.
The figure below shows the recovered locations of some cities.
The diagram shows the directions of German strikes, as understood in the General Staff, as of May 15-17.
It can be seen that the blue arrows on the map do not represent the actual plans for the German offensive.
That is, even in the second decade of May, the General Staff has no information about the operational plans of the German command in the event of a war with the Soviet Union.
The small arrow on the front of the PribVO probably symbolizes the auxiliary strike of the enemy's Northern grouping. On the flanks of the PribOVO and ZAPOVO, the main attack is expected through Vilnius to Orsha and Bobruisk.
Our command is unaware of a large German grouping in the Brest region. It will not know about this group even on the morning of June 23rd. The fact that the Germans decided to encircle the ZAPOVO group of forces and unite in the Minsk region, no one guesses.
Some "wise men" fantasized that there was only one road to Moscow - through Brest and Minsk.
Unfortunately, the General Staff doesn't think about it …
To fend off the attack on Orsha, the 22nd Army from the Ural Military District began to concentrate on the flank of the probable direction of the German advance from June 14. To the east of Orsha are the troops of the Moscow District.
For reasons of the General Staff, the enemy's Southern grouping is delivering its main attack on a vast front from the cities of Wlodawa to Sokal. Further, the enemy troops are distributed to Kiev and Bobruisk.
From the border to Kiev, four of our corps are on the way of the enemy grouping.
By the beginning of the war in the Gomel region, the 21st Army began to concentrate from the Volga Region. To the east are the troops of the Oryol Military District, of which the 20th Army will begin to form after the start of the war.
Now it becomes clear: where did the General Staff decide to send the 21st and 22nd armies from June 13? They focused on the directions of the German strikes, which in the General Staff, it turns out, simply assumed …
Unfortunately, intelligence was unable to provide information about the German plans …
The diagram does not show the enemy grouping in Romania, but according to the RM it is known that by May 31, reconnaissance "discovered" 17 German divisions in the border areas. 2/3 of this grouping were concentrated on the southern flank of the KOVO. Therefore, this direction is given a special role. From this grouping the arrow is aimed at Vinnitsa (Zhmerinka).
By June 19, according to intelligence, there were only 28 German divisions in Romania. In the prepared Directive No. 1 (as it was called in Soviet literature), there was initially a text about this direction:
The text about Romania was deleted, but the 1st Deputy Chief of the General Staff Vatutin after 4 a.m. sends a telegram to bring the 4th anti-tank brigade to combat readiness and conduct a reconnaissance of the advance paths and defensive lines.
Now it becomes clear GK Zhukov's assumption about the exit of the enemy group to the rear of the Western Front, made in the first operational report of the General Staff.
It was not about the direction of movement of the enemy group to Minsk. He was guided by the May preparation on the direction of the enemy's movement from the northern direction to Bobruisk and Orsha. Opponent strike on Taurage, Šiauliai is a support or auxiliary strike. No one suspected that the PribOVO front would be torn apart by two large mobile groups …
Therefore, they did not prepare to transfer large forces to a secondary sector of the front.
Thus, according to the May document, a scheme was prepared, according to which, by mid-June, they began to move in addition to two rifle corps of the 19th army, divisions of the 21st and 22nd armies.
It should be noted that all the armies were not nominated in full force: the mechanized corps were not subordinated to them.
Consequently, there was still time for the advancement of the mechanized corps - so they believed in the General Staff …
