Prisoners in all these categories were sent to Mine No. 17 at Vorkuta, later to Norilsk and Dzhezkazgan. These in effect were death camps where existence was so dreadful that many preferred to throw themselves under the wheels of the railcars carrying ore or coal.
Researchers estimate that between 1939 and 1941 alone, 1.8 million prisoners died in the camps.
Stalin, who was interested in creating the impression in the West that the Soviet Union was a humanitarian state, authorized a visit to Magadan in 1944 by the American vice-president, Henry Wallace, who was accompanied by Owen Lattimore, the noted Far Eastern expert. Wallace was very enthusiastic about what he saw. And he was shown very impressive things: a dairy farm, greenhouses where vegetables were grown, needlework produced by prisoners. Under orders from Moscow, the notoriously cruel Ni- kishov, director of Dalstroi (the Far Northern Construction Project, the euphemistic official name for the vast and deadly prison labor system in the Kolyma region), gave his important visitors a grand reception. Prisoners were shut up in their barracks; watch towers were taken down; male and female NKVD personnel masqueraded as prisoners, impressing the Americans with their health and vigor. On their return to the United States, Wallace and Lattimore wrote quite favorably about Nikishov, the NKVD, and the Soviet system.25 Later, when Wallace ran against Truman in the presidential elections, the Soviet press spoke of Wallace in glowing terms.
VICTORY AT MOSCOW
On September 24, 1941, the German high command adopted a new plan for an offensive aimed at Moscow; it was given the code name Typhoon. The German strategic idea was to launch an uninterrupted offensive from Smolensk to Moscow and take the capital by storm. The operation was entrusted to Army Group Center, under the command of General von Bock. At his disposal he had over 1 million soldiers: 44 infantry divisions, 8 motorized infantry divisions, 24 tank divisions (1,700 tanks), over 14,000 guns and mortars, and 950 fighter planes. The Soviet forces in front of Moscow had 95 divisions, 6,800 guns and mortars, 780 tanks, and 545 planes. Thus, the Germans had twice as many tanks and guns as the Russians, and almost twice as many planes.26
The German offensive began on September 30 and by October 2 had broken through Soviet lines at several places. As a result the main forces of the Soviet Western Front and "Reserve Front" were encircled in the Vyazma region. "At the moment when the German tank units pierced the Vyazma defense lines, no intermediate lines of defense were left between Vyazma and the Mozhaisk line, nor were there any troops capable of slowing the enemy tank units in their rush toward Moscow," says the official Soviet history of the war.27
By October 14 resistance by Soviet troops in the Vyazma pocket had been broken. The cream of the Moscow intelligentsia, who had volunteered for the people's militia divisions (opolchenie), were killed in this battle. Many had not even learned how to fire a rifle. It was not a battle but a slaughter. The fate of Jewish volunteers who were taken prisoner was particularly tragic; almost all of them were exterminated. The destruction of the Moscow volunteer corps, which went into battle totally untrained, sent by the command to ward off the blow of the professional German army, remains one of the most tragic pages in the history of the Nazi—Soviet war.
According to German statistics (Soviet sources do not mention the losses), the German army captured 663,000 prisoners, 1,242 tanks, and 5,412 guns at Vyazma.28
During the morning of October 15, rumors of the defeat at Vyazma spread through Moscow. Orders were given for the immediate evacuation of offices and staffs, both military and civilian. It was considered possible that the Germans might reach Moscow within twenty-four hours. Train stations were filled with people being evacuated to accompany their enterprises to new locations in the East. But there was also an "unorganized" population fleeing from the Germans. All roads east were crowded with vehicles and pedestrians. Many took nothing but a few possessions in knapsacks on their backs. It was a veritable exodus. The authorities in Moscow seemed paralyzed. Here and there, looting occurred in the suburbs. The panic reached its climax on October 16. There were cases of military personnel hastily changing into civilian clothes. Religious people prayed. Some people were convinced that all was lost, that the end of human civilization had come. Not until twenty-five years after the war, however, was acknowledgment made in an official publication that Moscow had been seized with panic.29 Nevertheless, the majority did not lose faith in the nation's ability to resist. During those difficult October days tens of thousands of Muscovites went out to build defense lines, and many of them were killed.
On October 19 a state of siege was declared in Moscow. The defense of the capital was entrusted to General Zhukov, commander of the Western Front. On the eve of the renewed German thrust Zhukov hastily brought reserves to the capital. The attack began on November 15—16. The forces of the German army maintained their superiority over the Soviet army in terms of artillery (2.5 to 1) and tanks (1.5 to 1), but this time, the Soviet air force outnumbered the German (1.5 to 1). The British and Americans had sent a large number of airplanes, tanks, and other arms.
Extremely bitter fighting ensued. In spite of their heavy losses, the Germans kept advancing toward Moscow. The Soviet troops fought tenaciously, defending every inch of soil. An example of the heroism of those defending the approaches to Moscow was the feat of thirty-three soldiers of General Panfilov's division who stopped the advance of German tanks at the Dubosekovo crossroads at the price of their lives.
Soon the German offensive showed signs of running out of steam. Tula, one of Russia's most important industrial centers, 182 kilometers southwest of Moscow, was encircled, but did not fall. Nevertheless, the main German tank forces were stopped only 29 kilometers from Moscow. Reconnaissance elements of some German tank units reached Moscow's western outskirts. But by then the German offensive had petered out. German losses had been heavy: 155,000 killed, wounded, or frozen; 800 tanks and 300 heavy guns lost.30
The German high command did not have enough reserves to continue the offensive. The freezing weather also helped to bring the Germans to a stop.
During those first six months of war, the Soviet armed forces and their leadership had acquired considerable military expertise; for the first time the Germans encountered serious opposition. The Soviet soldiers were fighting for their homeland, and that gave them added strength.
On December 5—6 the Soviet army launched a counteroffensive in the western strategic sector. The operation lasted one month, but it failed to reach its objectives, because of insufficient strength. Nevertheless, Soviet troops did advance westward some 100—250 kilometers from Moscow, relieving the capital of any immediate danger. On December 8 Hitler signed orders placing the German eastern front on the defensive.31
The Battle of Moscow was a major event. For two years the German armies had gone from victory to victory, conquering all of Europe. Now for the first time they had been stopped and made to suffer heavy losses. Their hopes for a quick and easy victory had been shattered. The rulers of the Third Reich had to face the prospect of a protracted war on two fronts. The victory at Moscow completely eliminated the danger of a German invasion of Britain, gave renewed strength to the European resistance, and fostered a crisis in the coalition of fascist powers.
The beginning of the Soviet offensive coincided with two other events of major importance. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the United States; and on December 11, Germany declared war on the United States.