Russia at war 1941-1945

FLIRTATION WITH THE CATHOLIC CHURCH—"SLAV

UNITY"

By the middle of May 1944 the Soviet-German Front came to a relative standstill. Except for the enormous "Belorussian Bulge" in the middle, where the Germans were still nearly 250 miles inside Soviet territory, the Soviet-German Front ran in an almost straight line from the Gulf of Finland, near the former Estonian border, down to Northern Rumania

and Bessarabia. To the north, the Baltic Republics were still in German hands; so was most of Belorussia; but most of the Ukraine had been liberated, with the front now

running a short distance to the east of Lwow. It was expected that, within the next few months, not only would the whole of Soviet territory be cleared of Germans, but that the Red Army would penetrate deep into eastern and central Europe—Poland,

Czechoslovakia, Rumania and Hungary, and possibly Germany. Finland was not yet out

of the war, the tentative armistice talks in Moscow with Enckel and Paasikivi having broken down. Vyshinsky announced this breakdown on April 22, indicating that the Red Army would have to make the Finns see reason before long. Since Finland had not

suffered a military defeat, there was still much opposition to accepting the stiff armistice terms, complete with a demand for $600 million in reparations.

Soviet policy in relation to the countries of eastern Europe called for some clarification; and almost the moment Soviet troops had entered Rumanian territory, Molotov convened a press conference on April 2 and officially announced that the Soviet Union did not aim at acquiring any Rumanian territory or at making any changes "in the existing social order in Rumania." The entry of Soviet troops into Rumania was exclusively dictated by military necessity and the continued resistance of enemy troops in that country. So there was to be no forced "bolshevisation" or even "socialisation" of Rumania, no abolition of private enterprise, perhaps even no abolition of the monarchy. All this, in principle, was a matter for the Rumanians themselves to decide. It was no use, at this stage, either

alarming the Rumanians, or upsetting the Western Allies with the prospect of

revolutionary changes in the countries of eastern Europe. Already, various Rumanians were in contact with the British and the Americans, with a view to getting out of the war, and it was no good frightening them off. The question of the Rumanian Government, as distinct from the "social order" could be tackled once the Red Army was well inside Rumania—unless, in the interval, "the people" (as Stalin said) were to change the government themselves; for the present, the Russians occupied only a small area in northeast Rumania. "No claims on Rumanian territory" did not, of course, relate to Bessarabia or Northern Bukovina, both of which had been incorporated in the Soviet Union in 1940.

The Second Front decided upon at Teheran was now known to be due in a matter of

weeks. The feeling widely expressed among ordinary Russian soldiers and civilians was that it would be "too easy", now that the Red Army had already pulled most of the chestnuts out of the fire, and that if the British and Americans were going to land in France now, it would be less out of any feeling of comradeship for the Russians than out of pure self-interest and even self-protection, since they feared that the Russians might now well smash Germany "single-handed".

These views were soon discouraged by Stalin, whose May-Day 1944 Order was

particularly cordial to the Western Allies. After recalling that the Red Army had

advanced in a little over a year from the Volga to the Sereth, he said:

We owe this success in a large measure to our great Allies, the United States and Great Britain, who are holding the front in Italy and are diverting from us a large part of the German troops, and who are also supplying us with highly valuable raw materials and armaments, are systematically bombing military objectives in

Germany and are so undermining her military power.

In paying a tribute to the Soviet rear, Stalin said:

In the past year hundreds of new factories and mines have come into operation,

dozens of electric power stations, and many railway lines and bridges. Millions more Soviet people have entered industry.