113. Golikov noted that the main German thrust would supposedly not be for Moscow but Kiev and the riches of Ukraine. Naumov, 1941 god, I: 776–80 (TsAMO, op. 14750, d. 1, l. 12–21); Pavlov, “Sovetskaia voennaia razvedka,” 56; Sipols, Tainy, 395.
114. One account claims Golikov met with the despot only twice following his appointment in July 1940. Lota, Sekretnyi front, 6, 46–7. Stalin’s office logbook lists five meetings, the last on April 11, 1941. Na prieme, 595. “It is quite true that Golikov was a misinformer—but that is not the point,” Gnedich, who delivered Golikov’s reports to Stalin, would recall. “All the ‘reliable’ parts of Golikov’s regular reports appeared in one form or another in the official press. Stalin, however, on principle, was interested in anything deemed by Golikov as ‘doubtful.’” Erickson, “Threat Identification,” 377 (citing a photostatic copy of the transcript of the discussion in the Institute of Marxism-Leninism, 1966, with Gnedich’s reminiscences); Petrov, “June 22, 1941,” 257; “Sovetskie organy gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti v gody Velikoi otechestvennoi voiny,” 27. In 1965, the historian Viktor Anfilov asked Golikov in the archives about his March 20, 1941, report. Golikov responded: “Did you know Stalin?” Anfilov: “I saw him up on the mausoleum when I stood in the parade columns.” Golikov: “Well, I was subordinated to him, I reported to him and was afraid of him. He had formed the opinion that as long as Germany had not finished its war with England it would not attack us. Knowing his character, we constructed our conclusions to conform to his point of view.” Anfilov, Doroga k tragedii, 193; Naumov, 1941 god, I: 42–3. According to Novobranets, Golikov issued imprecise orders; then later, if something went wrong, he would say, “I did not give such a directive,” or “You misunderstood me.” “We did not respect him.” Novobranets, “Nakanune voiny,” 172.
115. Naumov, 1941 god, I: 776–80 (TsAMO, op. 14750, d. 1, l. 12–21: March 20, 1941); Gavrilov, Voennaia razvedka informiruet, 568–71; Lota, Sekretnyi front, 178–84 (citing TsAMO, op. 14750, d. 1, l. 12–21). “ABC” reported (March 26, 1941) that he had spoken with an adviser in the German embassy in Romania, who claimed Mihai “Antonsecu told me that his grandfather—the head of state, [Ion] Antonescu—already in January had a meeting with Hitler supposedly devoted by Hitler himself to plans for a war between Germany and the USSR, and that a detailed conversation about this subject also took place during a meeting between Antonescu and Göring in Vienna.” Mihai considered the month of May to be “critical.” Gavrilov, Voennaia razvedka informiruet, 573–4 (TsAMO, f. 23, op. 24119, d. 1, l. 468–9).
116. Iampol’skii et al., Organy, I/ii: 61–2 (TsA FSK); “Iz istorii Velikoi otechestvennoi voiny,” 207. Also on March 24, “Yeshenko” reported further information from “ABC” about a meeting in Vienna where Göring supposedly told Antonescu to coordinate mobilization of the Romanian army with the German army. Naumov, 1941 god, 788–9 (TsAMO, f. 23, op. 24119, d. 1, l. 452–5). That same day Stalin received Japanese foreign minister Matsuoka (791–3: APRF, f. 45, op. 1, pap. 404, l. 83–8), and Vysheinsky received Schulenburg (793–6: AVP, f. 07, op. 2, pap. 9, d. 22, l. 44–7).
117. Berezhkov, S diplomaticheskoi missiei, 79.
118. Naumov, 1941 god, I: 804 (AVFRF, f. 082, op. 24, pap. 106, d. 8, l. 307). According to a Moscow NKGB summary of a report from Berlin sent by Kobulov on April 2, 1941, “Elder” met with “Corsican,” telling him “about the complete preparation and working out of a plan for an attack on the Soviet Union by his agency.” “Elder” was conveyed numerous details of German targets, German discussions concerning the involvement of Romania and Finland, and the opinion of German air ministry officers that an attack would take place. “‘Elder’ himself is not completely sure that the action will take place.” Kobulov’s report also included conversations with “Lycée-ist.” Naumov, 1941 god, 13–5 (TsA SVR, d. 23078, t. 1, l. 236–41). On March 31, the NKGB reported that “from December 1940 to the present time the movement of German troops to our borders has strengthened.” “Nakanune voiny (1940–1941 gg.),” 208.
119. Sergeienko, Sinteticheskii kauchuk; Lewis, “Innovation in the USSR”; Sutton, Western Technology, II: vii.
120. The upshot would be a commissariat for rubber. Patolichev, Isptytanie na zrelost’, 84–5; Na prieme, 329. Patolichev had studied at a rabfak, and in 1937 graduated from the newly established Military Academy of Chemical Defense (one of his classmates was Sorge). By Jan. 1939, still only thirty years old, he was named party boss of Yaroslavl province (replacing Shakhurin) and that year earned the Order of Lenin. In 1940, General Khrulyov introduced Patolichev to Stalin—the name clicked: Patolichev’s father, Semyon, had been a friend of Stalin’s and died in the Polish-Soviet War in 1920. The son declined Stalin’s invitation to assume leadership of the Communist Youth League. Patolichev did manage to get a protégé appointed as first secretary of the Communist Youth League in the Karelo-Finish Soviet Socialist Republic formed in March 1940—a young enthusiast by the name of Yuri Andropov (b. 1914), a graduate of the Rybinsk Water Transport School and, like his mentor in Yaroslavl, an orphan.
121. Hinsley et al., British Intelligence, I: 369–70.
122. Stafford, “SOE and British Involvement.” The Soviet role in the coup remains murky. Soviet intelligence had dispatched an NKVD operations group to Belgrade headed by Solomon Milstein and including the ace Vasily Zarubin; they arrived on March 11, 1941. Sudoplatov, Razvedka i kreml’, 136–7. German military intelligence suspected Soviet collusion with Britain in the coup. Vishlev, Nakanune, 25 (PA AA Boon: I. M. Akten betr. Abwehr allgemein, Bd. 12 [R 101997], Bl. Ohne Nummer [April 15, 1941]. Geheim. Aus vertraulicher Quelle. Betr.: Russland-Juogoslavien; betr. Balkan: Politischer Stimmungsbericht; Büro RAM, betr.: Schreiben des V.A.A. beim OKH vom 28.4.41).
123. Churchill, Second World War, III: 144. As in the case of Norway, Britain had helped embroil a neutral country in the war. Unlike Norway, Yugoslavia would be dismembered and descend into civil war. Catherwood, Balkans in World War Two, 157.
124. Naumov, 1941 god, I: 804–5 (TsAMO, op. 7237, d. 2, l. 79–81).
125. This was accompanied by an admission that Barbarossa would be delayed by up to four weeks, which might have happened anyway. DGFP, series D, XII: 372–3; Halder, Kriegstagebuch, II: 248. See alsao Dedijer, “Sur l’armistice.” Erwin Rommel, head of Germany’s Afrika Corps, independently launched a desert offensive on March 31, 1941, unaware of Hitler’s Yugoslavia directive, the pending invasion of Greece, or Barbarossa, from which his successful actions drained resources. Higgins, Hitler and Russia, 104, 108–9; Goerlitz, Paulus and Stalingrad, 30–3; Rommel, Rommel Papers, 119.
126. Germany, Hitler added, could not count on its allies: the Finns were too few, the Romanians “cowardly, corrupt, depraved.” Förster and Mawdsley, “Hitler and Stalin in Perspective,” 72–8; Halder, Kriegstagebuch, II: 335–8 (March 30, 1941); Warlimont, Inside Hitler’s Headquarters, 160–1.