Chapter twenty-one - The Great Patriotic War and its impact on the Soviet Union

Question 1

How long did Stalin wait to make a radio announcement?

Answer 1

2 weeks - 3rd July

Question 2

What was Stalin’s poor leadership in the beginning of the war?

Answer 2

Panic attack after the invasion and failed to give leadership in the first weeks - he prepared to move the government to Samara but decided to stay in Moscow at the last minute.
He relied too long on inferior commanders
September 1941 helped cause defeat at Kiev by refusing to let troops retreat

Question 3

What were the three distinct phases in the course of the Great Patriotic War?

Answer 3

June 1941 - the summer of 1942: Soviet Russia struggled to survive against successive German offenses
1942 - summer 1943: Soviet Russia stabilised its war effort, built a powerhouse war economy and halted German advances
1943 - summer 1945: Soviet armies moved on to the offensive

Question 4

What happened to the Red Army in 1941?

Answer 4

Between June and December, 2,663,000 were killed and 3.350,000 were taken prisoner

Question 5

What did the Russians lose by November 1941?

Answer 5

Lost in the area occupied by the Germans:
85% of pre-war aircraft factories
70% of the capacity of coking coal and iron ore
300+ armament factories
40% of pre war grain harvests

Question 6

How much of industry was moved to the East?

Answer 6

1523 factories had been moved including more than 100 aircraft factories

Question 7

How many new factories were created?

Answer 7

3500

Question 8

What was order 270?

Answer 8

16 August 1941
Issued after the surrender of 100,000 encircled men at Uman in northwest Ukraine
Commanders or commissars who leave the front or surrender will be considered deserters and their families liable for arrest. The families of Red Army men surrendering to captivity will be deprived of state entitlements and assistance

Question 9

What was Order 227?

Answer 9

July 1942
Issued at a low point during the way when Rostov had fallen with barely a fight and army discipline began to break down. This prevented soldiers from surrendering
‘Not a step back!’

Question 10

What was the impact of orders 270 and 227?

Answer 10

Over 430,000 men served in punishment companies

Question 11

When did Germany invade Russia?

Answer 11

June 1941 operation Barbosa

Question 12

Was the Soviet Union prepared for war?

Answer 12

Undermined by the army purges of 1937 to 39
Between 1939 and June 1941 armed forces increased and lagged behind Germany in terms of efficiency, equipment and leadership

Question 13

What happened in the fall of Minsk?

Answer 13

28 June 1941 - 665,000 troops were captured.

Question 14

What happened in the fall of Kiev?

Answer 14

19 September 1941 - half a million troops surrendered

Question 15

How many towns and cities were destroyed?

Answer 15

1700 towns as well as 70,000 villages

Question 16

How many died due to harsh conditions in Leningrad?

Answer 16

Leningrad was under siege from autumn 1941 to spring 1944 - 600,000 people died of hunger and cold

Question 17

How many civilian deaths were there?

Answer 17

It is estimated that by 1945 civilian deaths totalled more than 12 million

Question 18

What was Babi Yar?

Answer 18

Hitler saw the war in the east as a racial war, which led to the mass deportation of Jews. Soon after the occupation of Kiev in September 1941, the SS began to round up the Jewish population for extermination; 34,000 were taken to Babi Yar, a ravine outside the city, shot and put into mass graves

Question 19

Who were the Crimean Taters?

Answer 19

They saw themselves as a nation since the 15th century, strongly influenced by the Ottoman empire. Many died during the civil war and during the regime of forced collectivisation. Stalin was suspicious of their separate national identity. In May 1944, Beria organised the deportation of the entire Tatar population - 240,000 - to Uzbekistan

Question 20

How much of industry was relocated?

Answer 20

Whole factories were put of 20,000 trains and shifted hundreds of miles east

Question 21

What was the Soviet counter attack in 1941?

Answer 21

December 1941 near Moscow - managed to push German forces back 150 - 200km

Question 22

What happened at the attack on Kursk?

Answer 22

July 1943 - the local population dug 3000 miles of trenches and laid over 400,000 mines. 40% of Red Army’s man power and 75% of armoured forces were ready to attack. Soviet loss of 70,000 men and 1.600 tanks were greater than that of the Germans but they still won

Question 23

What was lost in the race to Berlin?

Answer 23

300,000 casualties including 78,000 dead. They lost 2000 tanks in three weeks.

Question 24

What happened to living standards?

Answer 24

Living standards fell by 2/5
7.5 million convictions for lateness and absenteeism

Question 25

What was agriculture like?

Answer 25

1943 agricultural output was 38% that of the 1940 level
Half the population did not receive state rations at all

Question 26

What was the contribution of women to the front line?

Answer 26

500,000 in the armed forces
Graduates of the Women’s School for Sniper Training killed 12,000 German forces

Question 27

What was the economic contribution of women?

Answer 27

53% of industrial workforce 1942 - 45
80 - 90% of light industry

Question 28

Women on the home front?

Answer 28

75% of the population of Leningrad
By the end of 1942, 80% of Leningrad’s industrial workers were women

Question 29

How many joined the campaign to report on the front?

Answer 29

Over 1000 artists and writers, 400 of whom would die in the fighting
One women was sentenced to seven years for telling a friend about the bombing of Smolensk

Question 30

When did Berlin surrender?

Answer 30

May 1945

Question 31

How many times did Stalin address the nation during the war?

Answer 31

Only nine times

Question 32

When was Stalin’s finest hour?

Answer 32

October/November 1941 - stayed put during the Moscow panic. He addressed the eve of the anniversary of the Revolution rally and spoke to troops with a passionate appeal

Question 33

How were scapegoats punished for initial disasters?

Answer 33

General Pavlov, who had tried to hold the frontline in the first week of the war was arrested, tortured and sentenced by a military tribunal and was shot along with three of his key subordinates in 1942

Question 34

How many troops were shot at the battle of Stalingrad?

Answer 34

13,500

Question 35

Which generals did Stalin come to rely on?

Answer 35

Vasilevsky, Antonov and Zhukov.
Vasilevsky and Antonov carefully prepared operation Bagration, which destroyed a 1.2 million strong German Army Group Centre in 1944