Barbarossa without the Great Purge

[dunHozzie]

Yet again, this thing about commissars and dual command system is mostly fictional and based around fairy tales essentially. Practically, it never actually mattered much even when commissars had the formal authority to override command decisions. Simply because it rarely ever happened. This thing from the popular imagination of commissar screaming at the officer in charge and threatening him with a handgun to force some alternative decision or order is mostly fictional thing.

That should indeed stay in 40k, where its fun.

Wartime documents mostly show that commissars during the war functioned as second in command and mostly took over if the formal commander was killed or incapacitated. And when you actually encounter episodes like described above it is higher-ranking officer threatening lower-ranking officer simply because these people almost always had the practical authority and weight of the system behind them while commissars rarely had that as they were outsiders and had very limited resources under their direct control. Remember, vast majority of commissars and political officers never had even a single NKVD goon (or anything like that) with them. Every single armed person around them was military and so they have very limited ability of being unreasonable in field conditions even if they wanted to because if they forced a conflict with the commanding officer of the unit they would loose it immediately if this commander had any authority and respect of the men under his command. And if commanding officer had neither authority nor respect, then it is exactly why commissars existed in the first place, no?

Here is the thing: even if it practically worked out for the best, the fact it was there, then it wasn't, then its there again, and even worse, it changed from iteration to iteration all through the interbellum only creates more chaos. Add to that lots of new recruits, and its a mess. Adding purges to it - to whatever extend it was - doesn't help either. BTW, what documents / books are you getting this info on? I'd love to do some more reading on it.

Basically it is extension of myth about barrier troops and what they were actually doing. 'Enemy of the Gates' famous scene most likely never happened at any point in the war because shooting your own troops that way was suicidal for people involved on multiple levels.

That was such a load of crap. I loved TiK's video on order 227.

 

[Crueldwarf]

Here is the thing: even if it practically worked out for the best, the fact it was there, then it wasn't, then its there again, and even worse, it changed from iteration to iteration all through the interbellum only creates more chaos. Add to that lots of new recruits, and its a mess. Adding purges to it - to whatever extend it was - doesn't help either.

To clarify the issue somewhat: I do not claim that dual command system was in any way beneficial. What I'm saying that Soviet command system was disfunctional on so many levels for so many different reasons that specifically dual command was very low on the totem pole of problems.

BTW, what documents / books are you getting this info on? I'd love to do some more reading on it.

It is basically all in Russian as English-language research on the Soviet side of WW2 yet again began to lag heavily behind Russian language one in the past decade and half or so. Digitalization of the relevant archives did a lot of good to the field and allowed a lot of people to do the work without expensive trips to the physical archives.

But for example my impression of relationship within the command structure of the Red Army mostly comes from a recent works of Igor Sdvizhkov on the early phases of Operation Blau and specifically about 40th Army and then 5th Tank Army actions during that period. It is very detailed and Igor Yurievich gives a terrific set of lectures based on his books on TacticMedia Youtube channel and it describes a lot of inner workings of the Soviet command, including various interactions between political and military branches. And it is very fucked up and disfunctional but not in a way that fits well in a common stereotype.

 

[Kurd Gossemer]

As people have said before in the thread, it went much beyond the purges and into structural and institutional problems that caused so much trouble even after the worst of Barbarossa had been overcome.

In order to change that, you would probably need some general that Stalin sees as his buddy who gives him free reign over the Army and the guy is skilled enough to root out many of the problems that the Red Army faced as well as politically savvy enough to convince the Politburo of investing in the army. Managing to keep a reformed and enlarged army under the command of this guy would result in a much better performing Red Army over the course of the war.

 

[RedSword12]

That was such a load of crap. I loved TiK's video on order 227.

Just don't watch any of his videos on socialism.

 

[TheLastKnight]

If Stalin didn't purge the army before Barbarossa, this is a very different Red Army. Both in doctrine and politics. Lets assume that Mikhail Tukhachevsky wasn't arrested and killed. Now if Tukhachevsky wasn't purged by Stalin, he would have most likely been exiled. Probably to the Far East or to the Stans. But he would have been recalled to European Russia when Barbarossa was launched. Now, Stalin always feared a coup either by the Party or more likely, by the Red Army after the failures of Barbarossa. After his comments of Stalin's performance during the Polish-Soviet War and now the disaster that was Operation Barbarossa, it strikes me as seriously likely, Tukhachevsky would launch a military coup and arrest Stalin and any of his cronies who didn't side with the Army. Tukhachevsky was also very popular, not just by the army, but also by the people themselves. I don't think he would be a one man dictator however. The USSR would either be ruled by Stavka or by a troika of Tukhachevsky and two other prominent anti-Stalinists.

 

[Crueldwarf]

Tukhachevsky wasn't popular either in the army nor among the wider populace. It is Stalin who actually was popular and it is the reason why he was able to get away with a lot of the shit he did.

 

[CaptainCalvert]

There is also the matter of arranging a coup and risking a civil war in the middle of a major existential crisis - and being given a great big arse kicking by the axis would obviously be perceived as such a real threat even if it wasn't as bad as OTL.

Also, if Stalin was secure OTL, then why would he be more vulnerable in a (slightly) less bad altBarbarossa? Of course, one possibility is that the OTL purges had removed or cowed potential troublemakers, who would be more numerous and more daring ITTL. But then again, knowing you put Stalin in his place is small comfort while being worked to death on a nazi-run farm in Lebensraum, and maybe that has an influence.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

The biggest differences entirely depends on what doctrinal developments and organizational changes the Red Army manages without the purges influencing the process, which is unknowable. While Tukhachevsky is the most famous, his name really acts as a mere shorthand for many of the Soviet theorists and officers on the cutting edge of doctrinal development who were also purged. It's conceivable that absent those purges, they might have developed more robust defensive theories that are better suited to the Red Army's condition in 1941... or they might have gone down some dead-end rabbit holes. Hard to know: we're talking about the realm of ideas here and it's REALLY hard to know what ideas people would've come up with had they lived. It's pure speculation.

That aside, the purges not also causing officers to become terrified of capacity building with their subordinates would also bring some benefits in terms of continuity of training and such, but given the scale of the problems the subsequent expansion of the Red Army in 1938-1941 caused, the gains there would be distinctly limited.

 

[Julian]

Zhukov commented in a 1944 memo that:

Firstly, we did not have pre-selected and well-trained commanders of fronts, armies, corps and divisions. The fronts were led by people who failed at one thing after another (Pavlov, Kuznetsov, Popov, Budyonny, Cherevichenko, Tyulenev, Ryabyshev, Timoshenko, etc.)

Under-studied and untrained people were also assigned to the armies. It could not have been otherwise, since there were no candidates for the fronts, armies and formations trained in peacetime. They didn't know people well. In peacetime, the People's Commissariat of Defense not only did not prepare candidates, but did not even prepare commanders to command fronts and armies.

The situation was even worse with the commanders of divisions, brigades and regiments. Divisions, brigades and regiments, especially second-rank ones, were given to commanders who were not suited to their task.

In short, each of us knows the consequences of the command of these people and what our Motherland experienced by entrusting its fate into the hands of such leaders and commanders.

Conclusion: If we do not want to repeat the mistakes of the past and want to successfully wage war in the future, we must, sparing no expense, train commanders of fronts, armies, corps and divisions in peacetime.

A much deeper pool of high-ranking, educated officers would be very beneficial. The Terror was also disastrous for military education, especially higher military education. Many skilled and experienced instructors were lost, and the remainder were quite terrified, as the GUGB noted:

A teacher who gives less than 75% of excellent and good grades in his subject is considered bad... A teacher who gives a student a “mediocre” mark is considered guilty of failing to teach for a better grade. A student who receives a “mediocre” mark stops greeting that teacher. The latter is surrounded by coldness and, on occasion, is “worked” in the newspaper, but he does not find support from his superiors. This situation leads to the fact that teachers begin to be “afraid” of their students and, in order not to get themselves into trouble, avoid giving marks “mediocre”, and even more so "unsatisfactory” in cases where this is fair and necessary.

 

[EasternRomanEmpire]

Tukhachevsky wasn't popular either in the army nor among the wider populace. It is Stalin who actually was popular and it is the reason why he was able to get away with a lot of the shit he did.

Stalin was all but popular with the populace, during his rise to power he had some support from the bureaucrats but not much else, he got away with what he did IOTL because no one was able to oppose him anymore.

 

[TheLastKnight]

There is also the matter of arranging a coup and risking a civil war in the middle of a major existential crisis - and being given a great big arse kicking by the axis would obviously be perceived as such a real threat even if it wasn't as bad as OTL.

Also, if Stalin was secure OTL, then why would he be more vulnerable in a (slightly) less bad altBarbarossa? Of course, one possibility is that the OTL purges had removed or cowed potential troublemakers, who would be more numerous and more daring ITTL. But then again, knowing you put Stalin in his place is small comfort while being worked to death on a nazi-run farm in Lebensraum, and maybe that has an influence.

Many of the Soviet failures in the days leading up to Barbarossa and even when the invasion began can be lain at the feet of Stalin and his decisions. In this alt-Barbarossa, because of better leadership within the Red Army, I can't imagine the Germans pushing all the way to Moscow and Stalingrad. Most likely, they are stalled at Kiev, Leningrad and Smolensk. But even then, the chance of Stalin being arrested by the Red Army may still happen. When the invasion began, Stalin thought his own circle had come to arrest him when they came to his dacha. If Tukhachevsky shows up instead, that would be it for Stalin.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

When the invasion began, Stalin thought his own circle had come to arrest him when they came to his dacha. If Tukhachevsky shows up instead, that would be it for Stalin.

I'm more skeptical. The thing is, that isn't how industrial/post-industrial, bureaucratic, professionalized militaries seem to react to sudden existential invasions. Their reaction - and the reaction of the Red Army historically - is to concentrate on the task at hand. To worry mostly about trying to beat back the enemy who is threatening all they hold dear and not at all about using it as an opportunity to seize power for themselves.

Rather it is usually politicians who tend to exploit such opportunities to try and seize more power for them. And the fact that it was Stalin's inner-circle - made up primarily of communist party politicians - who showed up and not the Red Army's High Command is also telling: the High Command was far too absorbed in staving off the threat to worry about whatever the civilians were doing, even if those civilians were their legal superiors. The fact that Stalin's power was in the end so absolute those politicians begged him to come back also speaks for itself.

That sort of Bonapartism is a more serious concern for the pre-industrialized society and for tinpot or kleptocratic dictatorships - where military and political power overlaps a lot more - than it is for modern democracies and civic dictatorships (of which the Soviet Union was the latter). But for all the paranoia the Communist Party had about it, there remains no objective evidence that Bonapartism was ever seriously entertained by the Red Army.

 

[pattersonautobody]

I have the unpopular opinion that the purge actually prevented a xoup in the USSR, which may have occurred following an invasion.

 

[Lalli]

I have the unpopular opinion that the purge actually prevented a xoup in the USSR, which may have occurred following an invasion.

Wasn't that just Stalin's paranoia fed with NKVD's own ideas?

 

[Julian]

In terms of doctrine, the Terror paralyzed efforts to update manuals and other instructions until it was over (with aftershocks continuing for years). Many pieces drafted or published by repressed individuals were withdrawn from circulation or limited to a narrow circle of leaders. Timoshenko summed up the situation in May 1940:

In the development and publication of manuals, regulations and instructions, regulating life and activity of troops there is no clear system. The army has up to 1080 items of manuals, regulations and instructions, many of them are provisional and outdated and require renewal.

The principal manuals: field service manual, battle manuals of arms, internal service manual, disciplinary manual – are also outdated and require renewal. Along with presence of many manuals and instructions absent are: instruction on employment of large military formations (army), instruction on attack and defense of fortified regions and instruction on operations in mountains.

While the absence of the Terror won't resolve all of these issues, not falling 1.5-2 years behind the normal doctrine work cycle and losing many valuable manuals would certainly help prepare the expanding Red Army's commanders to lead. The Red Army would benefit from not lobotomizing its "brain" (senior command staff) for several years.

 

[Siliwangi]

In terms of doctrine, the Terror paralyzed efforts to update manuals and other instructions until it was over (with aftershocks continuing for years). Many pieces drafted or published by repressed individuals were withdrawn from circulation or limited to a narrow circle of leaders. Timoshenko summed up the situation in May 1940:



While the absence of the Terror won't resolve all of these issues, not falling 1.5-2 years behind the normal doctrine work cycle and losing many valuable manuals would certainly help prepare the expanding Red Army's commanders to lead. The Red Army would benefit from not lobotomizing its "brain" (senior command staff) for several years.

What kind of doctrine that repressed? What kind of doctrine that changed? your quote just say outdated and too much instruction

 

[Gannt the chartist]

It is basically all in Russian as English-language research on the Soviet side of WW2 yet again began to lag heavily behind Russian language one in the past decade and half or so. Digitalization of the relevant archives did a lot of good to the field and allowed a lot of people to do the work without expensive trips to the physical archives.

The easiest to find and probably the best English source is Glantz, 'Stumbling Colossus' there is also Colossus Reborn for what happens next.

The Purge happens, what effect it has is arguable probably minimal. The US Army did a similar purge but it involved country club memberships and suchlike probably to a greater extent. So did the British but both are masked by the expansion of the army and longer training times available.

The real issues are the expansion of the army and relocation of its major bases westwards after the occupation of Poland. For example with the very rapid expansion of the RKKA after 1939 on top of its earlier expansion - its quite small into the early 30s. the number of officer slots multiplies many times. How do they fill them - by graduating officer students a year early. The problem is the two year course is year 1, political education, marching, history and suchlike year two is officer training. The Junior Lieutenant therefore misses out on all the tactical and technical training. They are then sent to the expansion units, and promoted from platoon to company and then to Bn command and staff positions in bases where the first priority is building the base the ammo storage areas, training areas ranges and so forth. Then they have another tranche of conscripts to train. Come war they are just graduated wherever they are and sent to the line, with most of the actually trained and experienced officers already POW or dead or even more overpromoted.

'Reserve Officers' are often students at University with no military training of any meaningful level. And ofc a lot of the 'purged' officers are then recalled.

Its not actually the senior officers - corps and higher in Western terms that are the real problem. Its everyone below them. You can come up with any number of plans but if the batallion and regiment commanders take 12 hours longer to get ready than the book says they are either not ready or everything goes off wrong or you are just slow.

 

[Julian]

What kind of doctrine that repressed? What kind of doctrine that changed? your quote just say outdated and too much instruction

Instructions on how to command higher HQs (Corps, Armies, Fronts, etc.) and service manuals for HQ departments (Operations does this, procurement does that) were entirely absent. The memoirs of contemporaries confirm the complete absence of “how to” instructions for higher HQs and the General Staff, which made the transition to war immensely difficult. Drafts of these materials were developed in the mid-30s and even used as the basis for General Staff lessons, but they were never actually issued.

Many of the reserve officers brought to command and staff newly formed HQs had weak military education, especially for the complex level of command they occupied. The absence of detailed instructions on how to do their jobs left them thrashing about all while trying to fight a skilled opponent.

As to instructions related to repressed individuals, the one Timoshenko mentioned on breaking through a fortified area was pulled from circulation because of repression. Often, documents were pulled even without direct high-level instructions because of the obvious risks of having works even tangentially related to “enemies”. To quote Brandenberger, Propaganda State in Crisis:

Internal party, Komsomol, and military reports indicate that investigators never knew what to expect when they surveyed library collections in the wake of the Terror. Often, inventories revealed library shelves to have been denuded of almost everything of value. In the Red Army’s Irkutsk garrison, for instance, excessively broad inter- pretation of Glavlit orders during the mid-to-late 1930s resulted in the library’s collection being stripped of all material containing even inci- dental references to enemies of the people, a methodology that left the base without essential materials like party congress protocols and back issues of important journals. The situation in Moscow’s Central House of the Red Army was no better; there Frunze’s collected works and many of Voroshilov’s articles and speeches were missing for the same reason. Other libraries had withdrawn texts as basic as The USSR and the Capitalist Countries and Our Motherland.26

At the same time, however, there were many libraries where the shelves remained rife with blacklisted titles. Over the span of just one month in March 1939, 314 volumes had to be removed from Red Army libraries. As late as January 1941, books about Trotsky and by Pokrov- sky were still being uncovered in division libraries.

So, the Terror both disrupted the Red Army’s existing knowledge base and interrupted the development of necessary materials.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

So, the Terror both disrupted the Red Army’s existing knowledge base and interrupted the development of necessary materials.

Well, that certainly explains such things as STAVKA having to issue orders which said such obvious things as "make sure you weaken the enemy with an artillery bombardment before launching attacks" in 1941.

 

[Cryhavoc101]

Zhukov commented in a 1944 memo that:



A much deeper pool of high-ranking, educated officers would be very beneficial. The Terror was also disastrous for military education, especially higher military education. Many skilled and experienced instructors were lost, and the remainder were quite terrified, as the GUGB noted:

I pretty much came to say this

Is does not matter so much if the doctrine is not as good as say the German one (the Germans also had a major campaign and several smaller ones under their belts - and while the Russians had a small campaign in the far east and Finland - it was minor in comparison - and I consider this advantage to be greater than any doctrine etc) or the given senior officer is not that brilliant - the purges robbed the Red army of many educated staff and field officers who knew how stuff worked.

This lack of Educated and experienced officers was made worse by the large expansion of the Red Army going on when the Germans attacked.

So the Red Army was always going to be at a disadvantage compared to the Heer but the purges made a bad situation much worse.