Russia at war 1941-1945

Railway junctions and Unes of communication were being destroyed by German

planes and diversionist groups. There was a shortage of wireless sets at army

headquarters, nor did many of us know how to use them... Orders and instructions

were slow in arriving, and sometimes did not arrive at all... The liaison with

neighbouring units was often completely absent, while nobody tried to establish it.

Taking advantage of this, the enemy would often penetrate into our rear, and attack the Soviet headquarters... Despite German air supremacy, our marching columns

did not use any proper camouflage. Sometimes on narrow roads, bottlenecks were

formed by troops, artillery, motor vehicles and field kitchens, and then the Nazi planes had the time of their life... Often our troops could not dig in, simply because they did not even have the simplest implements. Occasionally trenches had to be dug with helmets, since there were no spades...

Yet despite the terrible losses suffered by the Russians, morale remained reasonably high.

"It would, of course," says Fedyuninsky, "be wrong to deny that there were cases of

'nerves' or cowardice, but they were rather unusual, and rapidly overcome by the

steadfastness shown by the majority of the soldiers, whose morale was sustained by the Party."

How heavy the losses were could be judged from a regiment Fedyuninsky reviewed one

day: "It was now no larger than a peacetime infantry battalion."

It is curious how, after telling this desperate story of the 15th Infantry Corps retreat, and the story of the two regiments who broke out of a German encirclement after eight days'

heavy fighting, Fedyuninsky then dwells on the effect on the troops of Stalin's famous broadcast of July 3.

It is hard to describe the enormous enthusiasm and patriotic uplift with which this appeal was met. We suddenly seemed to feel much stronger. When circumstances

permitted, short meetings would be held by the army units. To platoons and

companies political instructors would explain the position at the Front, and tell them how, in response to the Party's appeal, the whole Soviet people were rising like one man to fight the holy Fatherland war. They stressed that the war would be very hard, and that many ordeals, privations and sacrifices were yet ahead, but that theNazis would never defeat our powerful and hard-working people.

But the retreat continued, and by July 8 Fedyuninsky's troops had withdrawn to the

Korosten fortified line in the Ukraine, already well inside the "old" borders of the Soviet Union. On August 12, after a further retreat towards Kiev, Fedyuninsky was summoned

to Moscow, and ordered by General Vassilevsky to fly immediately to Leningrad, where the situation was becoming even more serious than in the south.

More dramatic and tragic still than Fedyuninsky's story of the first days of the war is that of General Boldin who, in the winter of 1941, was to become famous as the commander

responsible for the defence of Tula.

He heard of the imminence of a German invasion on the evening of June 21, while

attending, with other officers, the performance of a Korneichuk comedy at the Army

Officers' club at Minsk.

Suddenly Colonel Blokhin, head of the intelligence department of our special