Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler 1940 211pp

The book is about the Stalinist purges and the Moscow Show Trial and was written in German while in Paris. 2/12/16 Rubashov one of the Old Bolsheviks finds meaning in politics, history, and philosophy. We see him wrestling with the meaning of suffering, senseless suffering versus meaningful suffering. He yields to the logic of the revolution as more important than any individual even when the accusations are complete fabrications. This book explains the period better than Stalin The court of the Red Tsar by Simon Montefiore 2005. The results of a godless, collectivist society. The Soviet Government is referred to as the Party while the Nazis are called the Dictatorship. Stalin is always called "Number1" Darkness at Noon is divided into four parts: The First Hearing, the Second Hearing, the Third Hearing, and the Grammatical Fiction. In the cell next to him is a person who supports the restoration of the Tsar He thinks back to people he had to expel from the party in Belgium as they never kept to the party dogma. One committed suicide. He is told that if he doesn't agree to the confession and public trial he will be at an administrative tribunal which is all secret. Tukhachevsky Soviet Chief of Staff purged. One of the greatest Russian generals Rubashov is interrogated by two secret police officials, the “good cop” Ivanov (a former friend) and the “bad cop” Gletkin (a younger, robotic apparatchik), The movement which was meant to improve conditions of the masses ends up terrorizing it people including it founders. R has expelled 2 people form the party Richard in Germany and Leowy in Belgium who committed suicide and the weight is heavy on Rs mind which accounts for his present situation. Ivanov the first examiner was a friend of R in the civil war. They were familiar with prison from being revolutionaries under the old regime. Ivanov was executed as he failed. The parties’ principles were right but the results were wrong. R is a synthesis of the people who were in the Moscow Trials a mixture of Trotsky , Bukharin and Radek – the dying old Bolshevik guard. Bukharin for example by following his ideal broke the oath of loyalty. Koestler was arrested on suspicion of being a Soviet agent. This book impressed George Orwell and Animal Farm and 1984 were inspired by it. By acting out the at the court he was persuaded to do one last thing for the party, but most did it to save their wives and children. The book was important before Russia joined the allies and then again with the Cold War. The old Bolsheviks were responsible for the Totalitarian Regime, they ignored the will of the people, and the Mensheviks remained democratic. Violent dictatorship eradicates individuality. Peasants are shown to be a reactionary class refusing government vaccination or burning a threshing machine. Koestler supports socialism. 402 represents the theme of individuality. Rip van Winkle was in jail 20 years as a revolutionary and then freed, came to the workers’ paradise and did not know that the Bolsheviks he supported were purged as traitors. The 1930 destroyed the goal of the revolution. R in the end discredits the Philosophy that the end justifies he means. If Lenin had lived longer he would have done the same as Stalin. The religious symbolism is shown. Rs patronym is obviously Jewish and there is a reference to Moses. After wondering 40 years in he dessert there is no sign of the Promised land and he has become a party scapegoat. 406 taps out Christian versus. R identifies with Christ rubbing his glasses on his sleeve is like the rosary. R is a savior but for what purpose is he dying. Stalin In the 5 years after Kirov’s death, the key intellectual leaders of the revolution had been purged or sent to Gulags . The Moscow Show Trials were to get public support for the government. The accused acted their role to save their families. Three trial s 1 Ivan Smironov one of 3 charged with Trotsky conspiracy. 2 Karl Radek accused of spying for Japan and Germany. 3 Bukharin recanted his confession and said he was innocent. Commitern was an organization to spread communism with a worldwide agenda in the 1920. Stalin was less committed to world foreign revolution and the with drawls of fund from those parties led to sever consequences for the party members. Bukharin was involved in this agenda but by 1930 Stalin’s priorities made him isolationist. Rs exhaustion is an expression of human limits he is guilty of opposition views . The masses are too immature to recognize their own interests thus justifying the dictatorship who led them into the darkness of night. It is better to follow immature ethics (old religion) than to be subjected to a dictator that irradiates individuality. Stalin was a prisoner of his own parties philosophy. The movement dedicated to rejuvenating mankind ended up enslaving it. The novelists aim is not to solve but to expose. 

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The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden 2024 272pg

 15/2/24  Story of Jews who survived the holocaust and returned to the Netherlands.

Set in the Dutch countryside in 1961, it’s focused on a woman, Isabel, living in her late mother’s large home. Isabel is set in her ways, and her routines are disrupted when her brother Louis insists that his girlfriend, Eva, stay with Isabel while he works overseas for the summer.

Eva is a typist at Van Dongen - an aunt passed on a sum of money to her and so she is quite independent.(so she says) Louis has a string of different girlfriends but they don't last long. He will get bored of you and I'll never hear of you again. Louis had digs in the city paid for by his company but was often abroad. Eva helped Louis decorate his room.

Louis only came to the house twice a year once at Easter and once to visit mothers grave at Swolle cemetery. Eva seemed like the type who had lots of friends.

Isabel went to church on Sundays. On Thursdays when Johan was in town she went to the Van der Bergs to see him so that he would not come to her house.

Uncle Karol had promised the house to Louis if he ever wants it, unspoken was that he must  be married and have a family, though he never did seem to want a family or house. Uncle Karol had found the house in winter of 1944 during the famine. At first only the children could leave Amsterdam. The house is bigger than the Amsterdam one and they have food. Isabel was 21 when her mother died. Her father fell down the steps and died a week later.

At school she was called shit breath Isa by popular Vera and the whole class followed and called her that because of the pickles she ate.. Bombs were falling over Amsterdam.

A women and a young girl came knocking on the door " She wanted our stuff" Isa was 15 when they first heard about the camps. They complained at that "the school treated them worse  and maybe should gas us" When the war  ended they never returned to Amsterdam but stayed in Uncle Karol's house. This was a house of fathers dying, mother dying, pets dying. Finding bullet holes and finding names on the bark of the tree who were not there.

For the mother funeral Hendrik and he male partner stayed in a bed and breakfast. Uncle Karol told her not to become a burden to her brothers.

Isa had a friend Silke who wanted to know about her brother Louis and then talked about every boy in the class. Isa asked her "are boys the only thing you can talk about." Isabel bit her and after that all the boys barked at her. Neelke was Silke sister and Isa gave her job as maid with great   satisfaction.

Louis had said that Eva could stay in mothers room and she wouldn't move out. Bijenkorf Catalog of a department store.

When Isabel had her first period she soiled her clothes and sheets her mother never explained what this was about.

Eva asked Isabel  "Is there anything you want to know about me? No said Isabel. Does nothing bring you joy said Eva? Why are you determined to dislike me 

The dinner service patterned with leaping hares, silver cutlery, blue baking dishes, a writing desk with a lock and key – all of these things play a role.  "Oh your so protective. Eva a house is a precious thing."

Isabel did not like Eva treating Needke as a friend rather than a servant and drinking wine together. Isabel had strong ideas of beauty that she did not find in herself.

If Johan touched Isa it sent shivers up her spine. Eva " is it such a strange thought that you should be liked "

Hendrik took piano lessons Isa did not even though she tried several times but gave up. The piano teacher didn't seem too close to his wife. One day after his piano lesson Hendrik went after the teacher and Isa followed and found Hendrik and the teacher entangled. When Hendrik arrived for dinner he had a mark on his neck and that was the end of the piano lessons.  Hendrik told Isa he lied he doesn't love me, I wanted Edwin. Like Louis before him Hendrik was suddenly gone and Uncle Karel found Hendrik a small apartment in Scheveningen. A coastal resort town.

When mother got sick Louis came for a day Hendrik came with a man. Isabel did not want the man to stay in the house and this cooled her relationship with her brother and he never came the next Christmas.

The only stranger who came into the house were the maids. A few years later Hendrik and Sabastian came to the house for a holiday. After the holiday Hendrik told her that he and Sabastian are settling in Paris and she is welcome to visit, but she said she can't just leave the house.  "Will you ever tell me anything  Isa" said Hendrik.

Eva gets Isa after some drinks to dance and then arouses her sexually and Isa thinks she has a fever as she has not had such an experience. Hendrik tells Isa that Eva is good for her as she has loosened her up.

The 4 of them get caught in a rainstorm and Eva askes Sebastian about his childhood.  He was born in Algiers and came to Paris aged 4 and his mother raised him alone. But his family was nowhere. 

In the draw was an EDH and her mother name was Elizabeth she never knew what the DH were for and never asked.

You've done this before with other women asked Isa? Eva has night terrors and Isa would stop her from hurting herself and Isa.  Isa wants Eva to be her partner.  Eva said I will have to go with Louis he is better than nothing. Eva was prepared to marry Louis for his money. 

 Louis phones and asked  Isabel to get Eva out of the house as he is has met Mary and is mad about her. Isabel kicks Eva out. When Louis and Mary arrive Isabel is extremely ill. Mary speaks English and French but not Dutch. However they wont live in the house as it is far away from everything.

Eva's diary is left behind Eva de Haas (hare) she reads the notes in it.

Malcha told me she knew a woman who came back from the camps and went to the women with whom they had left their things to be told that it had all been sold. Eva was told to always wear long sleeves. One family got their home back but had to pay back taxes and so sold the house in 1947, You have to sell everything and you have been tricked into poverty. One girl got the family who now lived in her family home to hire her. and as a maid took the things piece by piece. 

Eva had heard about the family  Den Brave now in her home that only the daughter lived there. She found Louis and managed to form a relationship with him. I think I could make him marry me.   Saw a woman in the market with a number on her arm that was 2 numbers off Mum's number.   After the war the Red Cross came for the French and Swiss  but nobody came for the Dutch so they went with the Swiss to Switzerland, where they were helped recover after a few years they came back home but the Swiss government wanted payment from the Dutch government who asked the survivors to pay up. They were sent to a big barn in Eindhoven for left over Jews.

When her mom arrived  back from the camps in Amsterdam Centraal in 1945 she was told she was lucky as the whole of the Netherland had suffered great hunger.

Louis told Eva that his mothers favorite animal was the Hare. Eva and her mother hid at families as long as they had money. She hid at a farm where the old women knew she was stealing food but pretended not to see her. Eva kept stealing things and sending them to Malcha. Eva says that for years Isabel had treated her mother things like treasure and takes care of them even the plate shard. When Eva was 16 she and her mother knocked on the door and were not admitted to the house. Eva had been born in this room and had carved the EDH.

The tailor shop that Isabel mother did not want her to look at where she returned a skirt that had been repaired insisting that That Jew had soiled it . 

Isabel requested  a meeting with Uncle Karel and asked him about their house during the war. He guaranteed her that he had not come on the house in a dishonest way. He only took out 2 biscuits? He said that every day people cannot pay the mortgage and the taxes. The house was empty. Every house has  a  history. The bank took back Parate execution' a standard procedure. Isabel said" I want this house to be mine and to grow old there."

Isabel found the Menorah in the wine cellar. Before the war a woman had given aunt Rian  an oven dish and asked for it back. Rian refused to even though there were 5 oven dishes in the kitchen.

People in the Netherland were living on rations and starving and not concerned what was happening to others. Hendrik and Sabastian were going to live in Paris. She told Hendrik he was lucky to have Sabastian. Hendrik reminded Isabel that when she had night terrors and he used to comfort her.

Needke had a boyfriend Bas van der Laan. Needke stops coming and married Bas in the city hall on a drab Monday.

 When Johan comes she wont let him in, he tells her that he is her last chance to marry but sends him away.

Louis told her she should make a effort to find a man and no man wants to move into his wife's home.  "I will never marry."" Hendrik will never marry" Louis agrees she can use the house while she is alive. He and Mary will be living in a city.

She traces Eva in a hovel and brings her to share with her as partners. Eva tells us her father was the school principle and died in the camps and didn't pay the mortgage.  The vitrine is empty as all the plates have been wrapped up as Isabel doesn't feel it right eating from someone else's plates.  She tells Eva this is your house and you must live in it with me.

The book ends with her looking at the local synagogue with the quotation "for my house will be called house of devotion for all" Isiah 56.7

Summer before the dark by Volker Weidermann 2014 172 pgs

 Stefan Zweig and Joseph Roth at Ostend, Belgium  1938  book originally written in German.    8/2/25

 An “émigré society” of authors and journalists – many Jewish – all opposed to and banned by Nazi Germany, try to continue with their lives and work in Ostend. The contrast between the bleak overall European situation and the sunny interlude., Irmgard Keun was in exile by choice, after her books were banned she tried to get compensation via the court but no case could be  opened. Her books were far too modern and suited for the Weimer Republic. She had a Jewish lover in American a doctor Arnold Straus he would have given up his wife to marry her.

 In occupied Poland an index of 1,500 prohibited authors was created. Under Alfred Rosenberg a list of Jewish authors was drawn up that contained 28,000 names   in May 1944 when the project was stopped due to lack of staff. Not all on the list are Jewish. In 1936  German publishers could no longer publish their books and so some looked to the US that had a big German speaking population. Lotta Altman had studied languages and was looking for a job as a librarian when the job with Zweig came up. He took her with him to Scotland when he researched Mary Quean of Scots. Zweig was 13 years older than Roth but they had an affinity to each other. Stefan Zweig was a German speaking assimilated Jew born to wealth. 

When Roth finally wrote Job and the Radetzky March both books should have brought him fame and fortune they were banned in Germany and Austria. Roth's books yearned to travel back in time. He was an advanced  alcoholic and had swollen feet as a result. His book The Wandering Jew portrayed East European Jews and how they were treated by the more Westernized German Jews. This was the world that he came from and knew and Jews had no home.  Zweig was moved by this book and this created the lifelong friendship. They were both in a situation of flight.

Roth was back at his family home with  Irmgard Keun here he did not have to act somebody he was not, and  could enjoy speaking Yiddish his mother tongue. His novel Strawberries documents this .

 Roth had a plan for emperor in waiting Otto van Habsburg to take over from Austrian Chancellor Schuschnigg but he is tipped off to get out of Austria. He is sent a message by the head of state security. He goes to Paris the day before the Anschluss on 12 March 1938.

1938 Stafan Zweig meets up with Roth in Paris who is in a bad shape as Irmgard Keun has left him for a naval officer. For almost 2 years they had a fantastic relationship of writing together. Roth's last book The story of a holy Drinker but is not able to get it published. When he hears that Ernst Toller committed suicide , Fredrika Zweig is with him and takes him  hospital where is dies from his liver disease. Freidl Roth after her parents emigrated to Palestine was in a mental home and was murdered by the Nazi euthanasia program.

Author Koestler born in Budapest and received money from Willi Meunzenburg to write a sequel to the Good soldier Sweik unfinished a satirical dark comedy novel by Czech writer Jaroslav Hasek. Koestler was too Jewish and  later became a Zionist. He was disillusioned with communism when he  wrote Darkness at Noon.

The Spanish civil war started after the monarchist opposition leader Jose  Calvo Setoto was murdered by the fascist led by Franco. Koestler was to go to Spain and find evidence of German and Italian support for Franco.

Ernst Toller play No More Peace was produced on the London stage it was translated by WHAuden into English. Christinana was supposed to act in the1933 Nazi propaganda movie Hans Westmar (based on the Horst Wessel story ) but declined and married Ernst Toller in London when she turned 18. She had been a child star at 15.

The boxer Max Smelling 1905 to 2005  refused to bow to Nazi pressure and divorce Czech-born actress Anny Odra wife or leave Jewish manager Joe Jacobs.

Stefan Lux a Czech Jewish reporter committed suicide during the packed assembly of the League of Nations.

Franz Josephs brother Maximillian was crowned emperor of Mexico here, Kirsh claims he was Napoleons grandson.

Irmgard Keun read all  Roth's books. He got her to be a disciplined writer a writing was a sacred duty. Roth knows he has no home anymore. Irmgard Keun can't get a divorce from her Nazi soldier husband in Germany ,Roth tell her to write about the Negroes and Jews that she is sleeping with in Belgium.

1940 May German troops marched into Ostend and the city was destroyed and had not ever reverted to how it was then.

Willi Meunzenburg 1889 to 1940 in Weimer he was a Communist Press Czar. Disappeared in France under the Vishi regime?

Egon Erwin Kisch went to NY then Mexico and after the war returned to Prague where he died in 1948 where he received a big state funeral. He was a leading anti fascist reporter.

Author Koestler 1903- 1983 Hungarian born, repudiated Communism  in his book Darkness at Noon. He spoke a number of languages went from writing in German to French and then English. In 1983 with his wife Cynthia committed suicide

 Irmgard Keun hid in Holland under the German troops. Nazi's had claimed in the press he had died. In 1977 the magazine Stem discovered her and her books were reprinted, so her financial position recovered. Died in Cologne in 1982.

In the post war period the old exiled writers were not able to get their recognition again as a new younger wave of German writer took over. In the 12 Hitler years a generation never knew them.

Inside of Time: My Journey from Alaska to Israel by Ruth Gruber2002

1940 to 1952  Ruth Gruber reports on her life and travels in this time.  5/2/25

Harold L Ickes was Secretary of the Interior. he had cleaned  up the Teapot Dome Scandal. The Teapot Dome scandal has historically been regarded as the worst such scandal in the United States^[  of cabinet corruption. It is often used as a benchmark for comparison with subsequent scandals.

1924 Revenue Act. the right to obtain the tax records of any taxpayer.

1939,I Went to the Soviet Arctic,  Ickes wife read this book and as a result wanted Ruth to work for  him to report directly on what was happening in Alaska as it was only 3 and a half miles Bering Straight from Russia and could be important in the case of war.   Alaska was a 5th the size of the US and only had 30,000 Whites and 30,000 native peoples. Alaska became state in 1959 (Note 2023 the population was 733406 with full employment. 16% are Native American.) So she informed the Herald Tribune that she was working for the government and not doing a series of article for them. The question was how to populate the territory and also conserve its resources and natural beauty.

She was the only women reporter at  press conference with FD Roosevelt. She knew Walter Lipman 1889 to 1974 a leading reported who introduced the concept of the Cold War.  

She attended an all women press conference under Eleonor Roosevelt. People hated her power over the President.

She had to get a security clearance and be fingerprinted at the FBI and Edgar J Hoover assured Ickes that she was clean. She was now sworn in as the representative of  the Alaska Railway. She took a train to LA and then from there to Seattle  She was warned that she would be attacked in the press but they were really attacks on Ickes. The Arctic explorer Vihijalmur Stefanson,  explored Alaska in 1908. He wrote in the press that Ruth Gruber was a very suitable person for the job.  1898 Alex Hrdlicka an anthropologist who had spent 4 years in Alaska, studying the migration routes of man from Siberia to America. There was not much other research done on Alaska. 

Sourdoughs was the name for early Alaskan settlers. On the steamship she was told that only 2 types of women came to Alaska schoolmarms and whores and the purser seats them by profession. However she found young women who were travelling to be clerks , stenographers, telephone operators and brides. Prostitution was a big profession in the Gold Rush days then settled down to marry. As on all frontiers few middle class types were there. Doukhobor sect were Christian who had fled Russia 75 years earlier and wanted religious freedom as the rejected the Russian Orthodox Church.

She visited Juneau the Territory Capital. The Baranhof hotel a 9 story building named after the Russian governor Alexander  Baranov who ruled Alaska between 1790 and 1818.

Drinking and gambling was a major problem. The big companies paid Federal taxes but refused to pay local taxes. She was taken to the Mendenhall Glacier. (Note we also saw this on our Alaska cruise)  

Anchorage 1941  the biggest town along the Railroad was where she set up home and workplace. She met the upper crust of Alaska and the military brass who were preparing Alaska for war. Alaska had 22,000 US troops and airbases were hurriedly being build at Kodiac and Sitka, as refueling station between the US and Soviet Union. Here there were gold and coal in the mountains a good harbor for ships and a railroad linking Mt. McKinley to Fairbanks. It had a row of brothels in wooden shacks. There was a school in every village and the University of Fairbanks which opened in 1922. Fairbanks was founded by the gold find there in 1902. At the cemetery a section for prostitutes. 

Ruth could imagine farmers who had left the dust bowl coming there, people who wanted adventurous independent . lives and doctors and nurses who wanted to help the native peoples who were being destroyed by alcoholism and new diseases. Tuberculosis was a big problem and she recommended a hospital be set up for that. Airmen from Britain, Canada Australia, USSR and US from Fairbanks flew to Russia. Women here were doing everything from running businesses, judges, community leaders as well as a woman miner running her mine.  Mount McKinley, is the highest mountain peak in North America, 20,310 feet above sea level.

At None there was the Catholic Church and the Swedish Lutherans. At one time you had the Russian Orthodox Church there. At St. Michaels you had the onion shaped domes of the Russian Church. When she showed children magazines they were most interested in the adverts. She met a women that had a herd of over 4000 deer.

Dancing is important in Eskimo folk law and it usually follows a successful hunt. At this time the average lifespan Eskimos was 24 years. Teachers had been sent but there was a resistance to sending doctors. Movies brought the war to this isolated area. You could see Japanese cannery ships fishing in these waters.

St Paul's has the Pribilof island largest seal rockery in the world where seals came out of the water to mate and bear their young. The Fouke Fur Company had an exclusive contract with the Federal Gov. for seal skins. The eerie death fields for women's coats. 1182 seals were killed the morning she was there.  The pelts were scraped for blubber for soap and the ground up carcass for dogfood.  Commercial harvesting of seals was ended in 1984. There are about 900,000 seals left at the peak there were 3 million. The cinema was segregated with whites in the gallery and Aleuts sat below. When the US bought Alaska in 1867 the picked up where the Russians left of by treating the Aleuts as and government slaves.

Stinson105 an aircraft with high wings were build in the 1940s and carries 2 people. The Arctic is the hardest place to fly. In 1935 the entertainer Will Rogers had died near Point Barrow. Life here revolved around whaling and walrus hunting and this was not hunting for the profit of people far away but only to feed their families. The catch of a huge walrus would be divided up amongst the hunter and frozen to survive the long harsh winter.

Dutch Harbor was preparing for war and young soldiers were keen to talk to here about their longing for home. The were displaced from their farms ,  jobs and schools and traumatically their homes.

From Anchorage she visited Matanuska valley a government project to take people out of the dustbowl, and this was a success. 750 people lived at Palmer an agricultural dream of lush fields and healthy cattle. Many farms were run by the wives while the men had jobs at the army base. People who had  living on relief,  here now had jobs on farms , sawmills roadwork and the air base.

Once America entered the WW2 Alaska was on the front line. The Japanese canneries on the coast - How many of them were spy ships. A thousand Aleuts were evacuated from the islands. Japanese bombed Dutch Harbour and captured Kiska and Attu islands. At wars end the native population was returned to their homes. The army now wanted to get army wife's and children off Alaska but they refused to go. Once the women were evacuated then many business folded, leaving liquor as the only viable business.

Once Ruth returned from Alaska, Ickes wanted here to remain on as his special assistant. She now edited a movie about the territory. She drafted speeches for Ickes. All mail to do with homesteading came to her. She discussed the need for more women in Alaska. Eleonor Roosevelt phoned her as she had letters from soldiers who wanted to homestead in Alaska after the army service and could she write replies. She now wrote a book that would be sent to these potential settlers. This was 63 pages including maps and Alaska's history. 1867 the US bought Alaska from Peter the Great for $7.2 million.

When Ruth returned to Washington the train was packed with soldier, sailors and airmen. The imminence of war was everywhere.

1943 Ickes called her to go to Canada's Northwest territories and report on the Canol Project and Alcan Highway  and how the army was getting along with the project. The Canol Poject involved the construction of 3985 kilometers of winter and summer roads, 2512 kilometers of pipeline, tank farms, airfields, and an oil refinery. This project was abandoned in the end as there was not sufficient oil. Oil had been discovered in 1919. 

From White Horse in British Colombia to Skagway in Alaska. There were not yet good maps or the area. You had to wear sunglasses and there was a problem of dust, and mosquitoes. The Alcan Highways was from Edmonton to Fairbanks to take food, munitions and medicines to win the war. Most of the workers were African American from the South. She complained that these soldiers were not given clothes for the cold weather. This highway was built in 9 months. A network of weather bureaus was set up.  In Seattle the US Employment Service started recruiting single women for Alaska. The Matanuska valleys farmers earned very well and were able to feed the local army and civilian population. Roads and transport was still a problem

Helen Reid took over running the Herald Tribune and hired more women reporter than other papers. She had just printed a series of articles that government official were Nazi sympathizers. Eleanor "Cissy" Patterson was the owner and publisher of the Washington Times. She also met Henri Bernstein a French playwright

1941 Ion Antonescu the Romanian Dictator  began murdering his Jews. The State Dept. wanted to hear no more about Hitler atrocities against  Jews. Morgenthau approach Roosevelt who set up the War Refugee board a thousand refugees from Romania were taken to Naples, they also took Lion Feuchtwanger , Thomas Mann and Marc Chagall as well as 425,000 German POWs. The 1000 refugees  taken to Camp Ontario at Oswego. Ruth went with the refugees by train. Later on She went with Eleonor Roosevelt and Elinor Morgenthau to visit the camp. The refugees were surprised to see the First Lady visiting. These refugees were brought in by FDR on the pretext that they would go back at the end of the war, with much maneuvering they were allowed to stay.

Robert Sherwood was a playwright and FDRs speechwriter.

When the war ended she corresponded through Europe the Middle East. UNSCOP the United Nation Special Committee on Palestine. Travelling abroad immediately after the war was only for journalists, camera men and people with special permission. You flew from Gander Newfoundland to Shannon ,Ireland. The 6 American were meant to support the opening of Palestine to Jews while the British 6 were meant to veto it.

Stuttgart was a city to which German Jewish Holocaust victims had returned and hoped to rebuild there lives there.

 This was the 20th committee studying the Jewish Palestine issue.  Later she was in Israel to write on the 1973 War

The farm that had been owned by Julius Streicher publisher of the Sturmer amti-Semitic paper  was turned into a training centre for youths who intended to go to kibbutzim in Palestine.

Nuremburg was a demolished city US bomber knew it was Hitler's favorite city. The UNSCOP committee met in Vienna which before the war was a city of operas and symphonies now was a kaleidoscope of post war poverty. Amongst the rumor's was that the US was sending German Jews to govern Germany and Austria. In Cairo Arab speakers stated that Jewish immigration to Palestine would be regarded as an act of war.

Gershon Agronsky was the American editor of the Palestine Post. At the Hadassah Hospital Jerusalem there were many American doctors and nurses.

Ruth went to Amman and met King Abdulla as well as his grandson Prince Hussein. Haifa she considered a morning city with people working in factories and oil refineries, Tel Aviv was High Noon while Jerusalem a Night City. The report was finally decided in Lausanne Switzerland. Bevin announced that Britain would not accept the report.

There were American students studying in Israel under the GI bill.

When Israel's war of Independence began Ruth was sent back report on it. While in Alaska settlers were cutting down trees to develop towns in Israel they were planting trees. There were no flights to Israel and she came by ship. The nightly curfew under the British were over. She met Ben Gurion and told him that the condition in the new immigrant camps were bad. He asked her to write a report on the situation and got all his minister to visit them.  They started building development towns to absorb the immigrants 

1952 She showed Eleonor Roosevelt around Israel and that it was absorbing thousands of immigrants.

Spouse: Henry Rosner(m. 1974–1982), Phillip Michaels (m. 1951–1968) Children: David and Celia Michaels. Ruth Gruber died in 2016

The Great Patriotic War by Michele M Amici, 193pg 2024

 The Bloodiest  Conflict least known in the West.24/1/25

In WW2 450,000 Americans died while in the Soviets 27,000, 000 died, and unlike US territory, Russia's land was left devastated. The Soviets tore the guts out of the German war machine. Even at the end of the European war the Soviets in Manchuria overwhelmed the Japanese defenses and then it was impossible for Japan to continue.

1944 June to August Operation Bagration  the massive attack in Belarus the Germans lost 450,000  while the Soviets lost 600,000 men.

The powerful countries like Britain and France failed to grasp the signals heralding the storm.

1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria.

1935 Italy invaded Ethiopia

1936 Spanish Civil War. Western Governments supported the Spanish Republic with volunteers  but remained neutral while fascist governments sent massive aid. This was an ideological war.

1939 The Spanish Falange government was recognized and implicit admission of defeat for democracies. Mikhail Tukhachevsky a Marshal of the Red Army collaborated with Trotsky to build up the Red Army, and represented the Soviets at George V funeral in London. In both London and Paris he proposed a  pre-emptive trike against Germans growing danger of armaments. Tukhachevsky was executed on trumped up charges in 1937 with his associates. 35,000 officers out of 144,000 were purged. All 8 Admirals and 3 of 5 Marshals were removed.

1938 Munich Conference showed that Western powers were prepared to appease Hitler. Once the war started the Germans occupied Denmark and the Norway to have access to Swedish iron ores.

The Finish War indicated how unprepared the Red Army. The Russians lost more soldiers than there were soldiers in the Finnish army.  Finland  25, 904 soldiers killed while the  Soviets 126,875 killed.

Now Generals in the gulags were reintegrated into the army including Rokossvsky. The Soviet spy Richard Sorge in Tokyo was able to inform Moscow exact day threat the attack from Germany would come.

Once France fell the Japanese marched into French Indochina without firing a shot.

1941 June 22,  Operation Barbarossa, during World War II, code name for the German invasion of the Soviet Union,3 days later Finland declared war on Russia.   The Germans estimated that it would take 3 or 4 months for decisive victory on the Eastern Front. The Germans sent 3 army groups North to Leningrad, Centre to attack Belarus, and Moscow and South which included 200,000 Romanians into Ukraine. Here the Germans plundered without regard for the native population. Russians units were alerted only a few hours before the German attack began. The vastness of European Russia and lack of roads made it hard to keep the German divisions supplied, especially where the dirt roads turned into swamps.

Stalin called for the entire population to start partisan warfare. Soldiers had been trained for this before the war started. Especially in Belarus, but as the Germans penetrated it was more difficult for partisans to get supplies. They attacked railway lines and trains later leading the Germans to keep more troops back from the front. In the first 3 days of war the Germans destroyed 3100 airplanes.to a loss of only 78 German planes. Operation Silver Fox was to take the port of Marmusk but with heavy Finn and German  losses only got to 50km of it and remained here till wars end.

Battle of Kiev 90% of the troops 760,000 were trapped, this was the greatest of encirclement battles in history. The Romanians offensive to take Odessa stalled due to their exhaustion. Soviet reinforcements came by sea but then evacuated their troops as German troops after the fall of Kiev were heading that way. 

1941 October more that 350,000 Russian troops and civilians were taken out surpassing the Dunkirk( where 338,000 troops fled to England on in 8 days after 1940 May26.) In Odessa there were 2,000 Soviet women snipers but only 500 survived.

The German southern fronts objective was to get the oil fields of the Caucasus and the Ukraine where the majority of the Soviet factories were or the precious mines of the Donbas.

The British immediately acted to aid Russia. If the Germans managed to get hold of Russian unlimited resources the British would have to capitulate to Hitler.

1941 August the first of 78 conveys departed to Russia. The Germans had air bases along the Norwegian coast.

The Germans now sent their Central group to attack Moscow, whose defenses was entrusted to Zhukov by Stalin. Richard Sorge told Stalin that Japans intentions were not to attack Russia but the USA. The Germans used horses to bring artillery but their difficulty in the mud resulting in the exhausted horses having to be shot. The Russian gauge railway was unsuitable for German trains. Moscow citizens mobilized into a Red Militia building barbed wire and tank ditches. Stalin proclaimed his intention to remain in the capital. November 6th the 14th anniversary of the Revolution was celebrated with soldiers marching out to the  battle front.

The temperature dropped and German panzers had no antifreeze  in the radiators and the engines broke and soldiers lacked warm clothing and and got frost bite while the Russians prepared for counter offensive, led by Zhukov. General Konev and General Timoshenko and Zhukov converged on the Germans and drove them back 90km.

1942 Jan to 1943 March. Battle of Rzhev or the Rzhev meat grinder as over 700,000 were killed on missing after this. Rokossovsky was released from the Gulag and reinstated. Unlike Hitler who overruled his generals Stalin delegated the work to them.

Evacuation in the first 4 months of the war 19million people and 2,500 industrial plants were relocated to eastwards, especially places like Novosibirsk.  In the occupied areas the German soldiers had a license to kill civilians. There was Germanization and subjugation of non Germans. Many Baltic cities the Germans returned the old German names. Jewish property was confiscated. Mannesmann . IG Fabens and Siemens took control of Soviet State owned  property. The Germans wanted to set up Germanic farmers to control areas where folkdeutchers were. Ostkompany a Dutch German company wanted to  colonize with Dutch citizens.   Hitler ordered the complete destruction of Kiev the Ukrainian capital. This was not carried out instead the inhabitants were starved by confiscating food resources. 100,000 people perished  shot in Babi Yar canyon - Jews, Roma, communists Russian prisoners of war and sailors of the Black Sea fleet captured in Sevastopol

Of 5 million Russians captured the death rate was 57% compared to 4% of Anglo American prisoners. Soviet POWs were stripped of their winter clothing and boots that were used by the Germans. They were put into open fenced off fields without any shelter, they dug holes for shelter. The Red Cross tried to improve the situation but this was rejected by Hitler.

Wilhelm Kube the governor of Belarus was assassinated. Ukrainian nationalist were pro Nazi and it took till 1949 to pacify them completely. The Waffen SS accepted people who signed a declaration that they were Aryan and so 50% of them were non German  volunteers. About 500,000 men from Italy, Romania Hungary ,Slovakia and Croatia. Finland was meanwhile waging it war of liberation. Spain and Portugal formally neutral also waged a war against Bolshevism. In October 1943 the Allies pressured Franco and he withdrew the 50,000 men who were used in the siege of Leningrad.

1941 August Siege of Leningrad  till 1944 Jan. The Russian Baltic fleet was housed here. Hitler ultimate plan was to raze this to the ground. They wanted to cut the city off and let it starve and freeze. It had a population of over3 million before the war. Once Lake Ladoga froze supplies were sent in and people and wounded soldiers were evacuated. By the end of the war there were 700,000 people left most of them combat troops 670,000 deaths were recorded. Most food in ware houses was destroyed by the bombing and people lived on only rationed bread. There were cases of cannibalisms and bodies buried without edible parts. Following the victory at Stalingrad, the Soviets launched and new offensive on Leningrad.

Baku the  Capital of Azerbaijan had some of the worlds biggest oilfields and provided 80% of Soviet Oil. The Caucasus also has abundant reserves of coal , peat, manganese as well as areas producing wheat , corn sunflower sees and sugar beets. The Germans got close but faltered  from lack of fuel. The Soviet started counterattacks.

1942 July Stalin ordered the "No one  step back " No commander could retreat without permission. 

There was a shortage of fuel supplies for the Germans and they increasingly call for more support. Horse drawn carts were requisitioned on the spot.

1942 July Stalingrad till Feb 1943

The  Germans were 250km away from their objective Baku and from their could threaten British Middle East possessions. The name Stalingrad was significant but it was an important industrial centre and crucial for the line to the oil fields. The Massive bombing of the Luftwaffe was second only to Guernica. The book Enemy at the Gates is about the famous Soviet sniper Vasyli Zaitsev who killed 225 German soldiers including Colonel Heinz Thorwald specially sent against him. Just when the Germans felt victory was at hand orders came to halt the offensive to cover the front on the Don, where the Russians had overwhelmed the Italian 8th army.

Operation Uranus   The Russians with great skill to conceal this attack with decoys and dummies. (These deceptions were used in again in Kursk and Bagration) When they attacked they trapped 250,000Axis soldiers. This encirclement lasted 2 month in which time the Luftwaffe brought in supplies but not enough, and evacuated 25,000 wounded and officers.

Stalingrad showed that the Red Army had learned to win and was greeted with enthusiasm in America. Time magazine had Stalin on the cover as Man of the Year 1942. This was a serious setback for Germany even though their propaganda played it down. The Axis lost here 70 divisions (30 German 15 Romanian ,10 Italian, 10 Hungarian. A total of a million soldiers including 400,000 taken prisoner.

Kursk July/ August 1943

1943 Jan the Soviet managed to capture an intact Tiger tank and tested that it was immune to antitank current weapons. Spies in German informed that an offensive was planned for April on the Kursk plain. Ivan Konev set up defensive works including damaged tanks that were to be buried and used as fixed batteries. Soldiers were offered 1000 rubles for every destroyed tank. Model was Hitlers most esteemed General and had doubts about this attack so did von Manstein. The American were now landing in Italy and German forces were sent there.

1943 Italy exited the war. the Luftwaffe and German troops had now been hollowed out from the Soviet Front. Allied air raid were continuous on German cities. The Allies were now in possession of the initiative, while Hitler more and more interfered in military matters at every command level. Soviet General were left greater freedom while Stalin wanted to win and take credit for it.

The German retreat was orderly and they systematic destroyed remaining bridges and railways, power plants. The Soviets perused them  fleeing to exhaustion.

Kiev  This had 900,000 inhabitants before the war. Fewer than 200,000 remained. 100,000 deported to Germany as slave laborers. The Germans took factory machines , trams, trolley busses and church bells to Germany and destroyed everything else left.  Hitler still wanted to keep Crimea with its manganese mines of Nikopol.

In Ukraine the enemy had lost a million men and 1,800 tanks a loss that the Wehrmacht could not afford.

The US Priority was to defeat the Axis powers  while the British priority was to maintain their colonies. Roosevelt had very little sympathy for British and French colonial policies.

1943. Nov. Meeting in Teheran of 3 leaders. The British were more inclined to landing on he Yugoslav coast and support the partisans there who kept 8 German divisions engaged. Russia would take Polish Territory and Poland would get German lands east of the Oder - Neisse as compensation. The Soviets would enter the war against Japan.

Just by preparing for the Normandy landings would force the Germans to divert their troops. WW2 started with Britain undertaking to defend Polish sovereignty but that would be sacrificed.

Leningrad 

1943 Jan they started planning an offensive across the frozen Lake Ladoga to move the Germans further away and pushed them a hundred Km. The German North  Army had been weakened to support Manstein's troops in Ukraine. 

In Ukraine 2 staunch Nazi fighter each led a Ukraine Army Group under Model and Schorner. They replaced the professional strategists Manstein and Kleist.

1943 August Ploesti Romania, was the last source of oil in German hands, now the Allies bombers were close enough to bomb. The Romanian dictator Antonescu had secret talks in Stockholm about Romania exiting the war.

One of the Soviet techniques was to move men and tanks, trucks in the dark without lights and only fluorescent white paint on the back and front, so that the planes above could not see them. At the same time they sent a convey of tractors in another direction with their lights on. By now they had a massive supply of Studebaker US6 trucks and M4 Sherman tanks.

The Germans now had to pin down the Allies on Anzio beach in Italy and so the Luftwaffe deployed most of their fighter from the Eastern Front, and they were also needed to protect the German home front from the increased Allied bombing.

General Rokossovsky was preparing to fight on the Dnieper and engineers and combat troops were building tracks with huge quantities of tree trunks, fascines and timber, for mechanized troops to travel and in 2 days the surrounded and took Babrusk, Belarus.

1944July20 High ranking German officers realized that with Hitler alive it would not be possible to get out of this lost war. Operation Valkyrie with van Stoffenburg setting the bomb. The plot failed. In 1944 the west was known for the Normandy Landing the scale and defeat  with 900,000 Germans killed wounded or taken prisoner.

1944 22nd August Operation Bagration lasted just less than a week. German troops in Romania and those stationed in Yugoslavia and Greece all retreated towards Hungary.  The previous year King Michael had Antonescu arrested and concluded an armistice with the USSR and declared war on  Germany. Germany lost not only an ally but is source of oil. Bulgaria had been neutral but were now quickly occupied by Russia and so declared war on Germany.

1944 August the Polish nationalist underground of 45,000 in Warsaw revolted and expected Russian help. This was irresponsible and had not been coordinated with the Red army. This was by Free Polish led from London who in any case Stalin would purge after the war. They had wanted a National Liberation rather than a Soviet one. Before the Germans left Warsaw they deported the inhabitants and destroyed the city.

The Red Army entered Slovakia and the Balkans then Belgrade Oct. 1944.

1944 Oct. Admiral Horthy announced a armistice with the USSR. The Germans kidnapped Horthy and forced him to resign. 2 German divisions occupied Budapest and Ferenc Szalasi the head of the Arrow Cross Party was installed as the new head of government. This enabled the oil supplies  from the Lake Bataton area to continue.  With 50,000 German soldiers ,100,000 Hungarian soldiers remained trapped in the Soviet Grip while Ferenc Szalasi fled to Germany.

Zhukov now planned a new winter offensive along the Warsaw Berlin axis. While Allies were occupying Belgium a new massive offensive of forces started in Poland and the Ukrainian  front under Zhukov. The Belarus under Rokossovsky and General Chernyakhovsky the attacked East Prussia. The last 2 years of the war this army was well equipped an well trained buy furious from the depravations they had suffered. 

In East Prussia there were 500,000 German soldiers plus 200,000 Volksturm who were poorly armed and poorly trained adolescents and elderly or disabled and were massacred in the last battle in 1945. Although the Germans now brought out their Konigstiger the Red army was unstoppably overwhelming. The antitank Panzerfaust was much more effective against tanks.

The Germans abandoned Silesia without a fight as they didn't have the resources to. Industrial  Silesia had been the region that contributed most to the war effort in the last years, it was less exposed to Allied bombing than the Ruhr. the main industrial center.

1944 Dec. Budapest the Hungarian Capital was one of the bloodiest urban battles. of the entire war with hand to hand fighting, this was a great victory and a test for the subsequent Battle for Berlin.

The Soviets would retain the territory of Easter Poland annexed in 1939 and Poland would be compensated by extending its wester n borders at Germanies expense. 

Poland the pro Soviet or Lublin Poles was chosen, ending recognition of the Polish Government in exile in London.. Silesia, Pomerania part of East Prussia, the city of Danzig would now become Polish. Not the Polish issue is the one of first causes of  the conflict.

1938 Marshal Blucher dealt a sever blow to the Japanese army in the battle of Lake Khasan. At the Battle of Khalkhin the Japanese were defeated again by Zhukov. Japan realized that she could not wage war against both China and the Soviets at the same time.

1941 Japan signed a nonaggression treaty with the USSR as it suited both as Russia was dealing with the German invasion. The Atomic bomb was well underway but there was o guarantee of its success. Russia agreed to fight Japan with an official US recognition of Mongolia's independence from China. Mongolia had been a Soviet satellite since 1924.The US recognized the Soviets interest in the Manchurian railways and Port Arthur as well as Sakhalin and Kuril Islands. The soviets' would enter into war against japan 3 months after Germanys Surrender. is often referred to as the conference that divided the world into 2 blocks and the Cold war ended in 1989. Charles de Gaul was resentful that he had not been invited. Note The USSR was not given any more than what it conquered on the battlefield. 80% of German forces   been defeated  in Eastern Europe.

The Germans kept fighting Russia because of the relentless propaganda and sense of duty, the terror and revenge of the Soviets had a decisive influence on German motivation. In the USSR after 20 yeas of propaganda about their beautiful country , but then were shocked to see the prosperity of German cities in East Prussia and this added to their hatred of the motherland sufferings sand abuses. Russian looting was regulated to 5 kilos to a soldier and 10 for officers and what could not be transported was destroyed. It is estimated that about 2 million women were raped but it cost 600,000 Soviet soldiers lives. The scale of rape of Polish women led to a pandemic of sexually transmitted diseases. This was considered the largest mass rape in history. Abortions in Germany were illegal' till 1945.

American historian Norman Naimark. In Asian societies dishonor is repaid by raping enemy women, he also notes the Russian tendency to drink. The desire for honor and to seek revenge.

For Berlin the Soviets deployed 2.5 million men and 6,200 tanks. They also resorted to flame throwers and demolition techniques. The Tempelhof Airport was the last escape route. Many civilians died in a last final attempt to reach American lines.

1945 May 2,  General Alfred ordered German troops to avoid being captured by the Soviets. Once the Wehrmack was in disarray SS officers took command of German forces. Donitz ordered naval units to put to sea before the  surrender terms came into effect. Czeck troops rose up to liberate Prague before the Soviet troops arrived at the same time Americans attacked from the  West  and experienced no resistance.1945 9th May in Moscow a second surrender was sighned by Mashal Keitel and Zhukov.

1945 April 12th Truman became US President. Secretary of State James Byrnes was hostile to the USSR.

Till 1949 in the Ukraine anti Soviet partisans continued.

1946 till 1949 Greek Civil War

1945 Tito annexed Trieste to the resurrected Yugoslavia. 

Austria was also divided into 4 parts 

 Nemmerdorf (now Mayakovskoye, Kaliningrad  Russia) the first East Prussia centre to fall under Soviet occupation Oct1944 unarmed civilians were massacred. These reports swelled the ranks of the Volkssturm and induced civilians to withdraw to the west. Mostly it was women and children that fled and once the overland route was cut off they were evacuated by ships from Danzig and Gdynia. Men were forced to stay and pressed into the Volkssturm and then massacred by the Red Army.

1945 Jan to May. Operation Hannibal was a German naval operation involving the evacuation by sea of German troops and civilians from the Courland pocket East and West Prussia and Pomerania This was the largest maritime evacuation in history 850,000 civilian and 350,000 soldiers. These evacuation continued a wee after Germanies surrender. May 8th 1945.

Ukraine nationalist partisans were fighting the Soviets and this continued till 1949.

1945 May. Tito's partisans occupied Trieste to annex to the rest of Yugoslavia.

1946 till 1949 there was a civil war.

Austria was divided into 4 parts.

1945 April the Stalin announced he was not renewing the Japanese non aggression pact. Japan had about 800, 000 men in Manchuria. After a week the Japanese surrendered and the war ended. However the Soviet landed on the Kuril Sakhalin islands. Mass suicides were organized by the Japanese themselves in Manchuria. Japan had been defeated before the Soviets invasion and the Atomic bomb.. Japan had depended on raw  materials from the Asian mainland . The Japanese navy ceased fighting as they ran out of fuel. Bombers had destroyed 69 Japanese cities.  The Japanese were concerned with the fate of the Emperor if he fell into Russian hands.

Within a few years the British Empire dissolved. The US had not suffered losses on its own territory and had suffered less than any of the other powers. The Soviet had suffered the brunt of the losses 27 million people about 15% of the entire population.

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Battle of Kursk 2019 Hourly History 40 pgs. 18/1/25

The Bolsheviks brought down the Romanov Dynasty and governed with an iron fist that crusaded for the rights of workers while crushing dissent. At Stalingrad the Germans had been defeated bringing and end to the ambitions' of Operation Barbarossa.

The Battle of Kursk was the biggest Tank battle in history. The German Panzers against the Russian T34. The Germans lost 750 tanks while the Russians lost more than 6,000.  The Russians had been privy to German intelligence.

Vienna was the city where Stalin , Trotsky and Bolshevik leaders hid from the Tsarist government and they met at Cafe Central near Cafe Landtsman which  was where Sigmund Freud often went.  Less than half of the Viennese  two million residents were born there, so it was easy for foreigner to mix in.

Alexander Nevsky  movie 1938. Directed by Sergei Eisenstein. The prince of Novgorod prevented the Teutonic knights from succeeding. After the Non Aggression Pact this movie was withdrawn from theaters. Stalin forced modernization selling grain abroad to finance industrialization. Russia's foreign minister who was pro western and  popular and Jewish was replaced by Molotov. 

1939 August Molotov- Ribbentrop  Pact  divided Poland into Russian and German territory.

 Russia could now move into Poland and it is doubtful that they would ever leave, and now Hitler could invade Poland without opposition.

For Germany the Ukraine was a grain powerhouse and could provide her with food and captured Slavs as slaves labourers would boost German war production.  After Russia was conquered the British would seek peace. The Caucasus oilfields were Germany's first priority.

The plan for the campaign was not to take the German army into the Soviet winter and so no need to provide warm cloths and winterize the vehicles.

The Soviets had undergone the Great Purge of the 1930 and many military officers had been executed. If France was defeated with such ease how could the backward Slavs hope to do. 3 million German soldiers with 3 thousand tanks crossed into the Soviet Union 6000 motor vehicles and half a million horses. In encircling Kiev captured 600,000 Russian troops. Moscow was vulnerable but winter was coming and the Russian counter attack stopped them in December.

1938 Panzerkampwagen series, these were no longer secret after this. The first ones that invaded Poland had 15mm. armor. Panzer 2 were inferior to the British and Soviet tanks but Panzer 3 had 50mm amour but was no match for the swift Soviet T34. Later the Panzer 4 in 1943 would be the main German tank and had frontal armor. of up to 80mm. The Panzer 5 known as the Panther entered combat in 1943 in the Battle of Kursk. The Panzer 6  known as Tiger and had frontal armor. of 100mm but was over 55 ton and slow and heavy.

The Russians fled eastwards and destroyed all that they never took. 

The German invasion was so swift that it outran supplies and communication  then in Oct 1941 temperatures dropped and there was no antifreeze for vehicles. By this time the Soviets had 5 million soldiers. A million women serving as fighter pilots, antiaircraft gunners and partisan guerillas even in the front lines.

The T34 used diesel and had 45mm front armor. These also had railings so that troops could travel on the tank and was superior to what was sent against it. The Soviets  had 22,000 tanks more than the rest of the world combined 4 times as many as Germany and there was never a shortage of them for the battle of Kursk.

1943 February the Battle of Stalingrad was a turning point in the war. As the Volga froze the Soviets were able to transport soldiers and equipment into the city. Paulus and 22 of his general as well as 91,000 soldiers surrendered. Less than 6,000 of these returned home. More than 800,000  Germans were killed, wounded or missing here. 

Hitler reasoned that if Russia could be defeated the alliance between Britain and America would end. Germany could not afford to be seen as weak. By summer of 1943 two thirds of Germany army was in Russia.

The Germans tried to surround Kursk in this salient  from the north and south. This however was delayed from March as they were waiting for supplies. The Soviets knew months in advance about the attack location they prepared for the battle and in July the pre-emptively started an artillery's bombardment on the Germans.

The Red Army discovered that the new Tiger tanks had a weakness if hit from the sides.

1943 July the allies began invading Sicily. Within 2 weeks with the second part of the plan the Russians offensive pushed the Germans back expelling them from Kharkov to Western Ukraine. the battle of  Kursk had lasted one and a half months.

The Germans suffered 200,000 casualties including 80,000 deaths and lost 750 tanks. The Soviets suffered 850,000 casualties and lost 6,000 tanks. However the blow to the German confidence was conclusive, their technological advantage could not over come the Red Army.  For Russia people were expendable, not with the Germans who could not launch a new major offensive. Stalin allowed his commanders the freedom to make vital decisions on battle plans while Hitler had insisted on interfering with his generals. Kursk was the defining battle of this war.

Russians soldiers were drawn from a society and culture where suffering and pain and inflicting it were stuff of every day

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Nikita Khrushchev Hourly History2023  40 pg  16/1/25

1894 born in Kalinka close to the Ukrainian border and they moved to the Dombras region in 1908 where work was better for his father who was a labourer. He was apprenticed at the local Bosse Ironworks factory where in 1910 was involved in strikes. 

1914 wedded to Yefrisubua and they had 2 children.  In the civil war he was promoted to commissar of a full battalion of troops. After this war in 1921 his wife died of typhus and at the age of 30 married Nina with whom he had 3 children.

1925 was a delegate at he 14th Congress of the Communist Party and in 1928 Lazar Kaganovch the party head in Ukraine recruited his as deputy. He then followed him to Moscow . Here he became the leader of the party in the Russian capital and involved in the Moscow Metro which was completed in 1935 and received the order of Lenin. He showed complete support for Stalin's purges and almost all his friends and colleagues were killed or arrested in this period. 1937 appointed by Stalin to be party head in the Ukraine and was involved in the revision of Ukraine's history and like the Tsars tried to Russify Ukraine. They forced the Russian language but Ukraine was the breadbasket.

1939 Molotov Ribbentrop Pact. in dividing Poland with Germany. The Soviets too eastern Poland and this was a necessary evil to prevent conflict with Germany. This got territory from Poland that had once belonged to Belarus and Ukraine. Now 1.2 millions Poles were deported to Siberia and Kazakhstan.

1941 German invasion of Russia and Khrushchev was in Kiev in a desperate situation as Stalin had delayed mobilization. The city of Kiev was surrounded and  abandoned  the Red army had to make a desperate dash out, and  abandon the city. While Stalin was out of touch in Moscow.

1942 Spring Khrushchev had 640,000 troops to fend off the German advance on Kharkov the again dashed out before encirclement at the last minute with enormous loss and thousand of soldiers taken prisoner. Despite all he was put in charge of Stalingrad as the Germans planned to drive all the way to the oil rich Caucasus. General Georgy Zhukov led Operation Uranus who outflanked the Germans beat them. In 1943 Khrushchev son Lionid was a fighter pilot and shot down, in was claimed that Leonid had turned informant and died under strange circumstances.

With the end of the war 5.3 Ukrainians had been killed and 700 towns destroyed. Ukrainian guerillas were now attacking  Soviet occupying troops, some of these had supported the Germans. Ukrainian nationalism was very strong and armed resistance continued into the 1950s.

Stalin at this stage  was far more interested in hosting parties than running the affairs of state. Khrushchev organized that Pravda showed that Lavrently Beria , had become a western imperialist, he was executed. Khrushchev had signed all the execution documents so could not accuse Beria of the killing. Now everything bad that happened Beria was blamed.  

1957 Kaganovich, Malenkov and Molotov were actively trying to remove Khrushchev, so he gave the speech of the 20 Congress of the Communist Party condemning Stalin's brutality.  Khrushchev lined up people behind him and shuffled the 3 opponents off to meaningless posts.

1957 Sputnik  went into space and later Yuri Gagarin in 1961 and this showed the growing technological capability of the Soviets.

1961 Bay of Pigs a CIA disaster for the Americans to get rid of Castro's regime. Castro was aware of the plot and routed it. 

1962 With U2 planes Washington knew of the nuclear missiles in Cuba.  Khrushchev was forced to back down but in exchange America secretly agreed to remove missiles from Turkey, and the US pledged never to invade Cuba.

1955-56 The Sino Soviet split - this was over various ideological reasons, and Mao decided to break off relations.

With East Germans fleeing to West Germany  Khrushchev decided to build the Berlin Wall

1964  Khrushchev celebrated his 70 birthday and he received the prestigious Hero of the Soviet Union and the last decade was referred to as the Great Decade. However crops were failing and agriculture was getting behind and there was underperformance of industry.  Khrushchev jumped from one reform to another most of which failed to bare fruit.  Khrushchev had groomed trusted  Brezhnev to be his successor and Leonid Brezhnev played in his downfall. This was without bloodshed and it was quietly done. He was transferred to the Petrovo Dalneye, Moscow to a 5 bedroom house.

1966  Khrushchev began writing his memoir. Opinion on him had always been split on his decision to denounce Stalin. This was at a time that he was worried that Stalin was about to be rehabilitated.. Then in 1967 Lucy Jarvis conducted a documentary film that interviewed him. Soviet Officials warned him to cease this project. From 1968 he leaked it out abroad to the Russian corresponded of the London Evening  Standard. 1969 he spoke about Stalin's entire reign. The KGB led by Yuri Andropov with increased surveillance was ready to take him  down when he died of a bad heart attack in 1970.  He managed to reach his 77th birthday. That year the book  Khrushchev Remembers was published. 

Western media sung praised for him that he brought about greater accountability was against corruption and greater freedom of thought to Soviet citizens. Pravda barely mentioned his demise.

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 Panzer Destroyer: memoir of a Red Army commander. by Vasiliv Krysov 2010  300pg 30/1/25

When he started training they never had a tank for his crew.  First they had at KY 15. After a year training their class was sent by train to different fronts.  Bashkir national  are Turkic speaking in the Caucasus. The Volga German Republic were Soviet citizens who had been there since Katherine the Great. Stalin deported them to Kazakhstan and Siberia.

In the tank they all learned each other role. Russian forces were retreating along the whole front. In battle they  tossed a smoke grenade, to hide behind so that the could check on the engine. Junker planes flew over in squadrons of 30. In Nov they closed in on Stalingrad and when they were hit and the tank caught on fire they escaped via the floor hatch, if they came out the turret they would have been shot.

They were wearing winter garb, valenki (felt boots), quilted pants, quilted jackets ,underneath greatcoats with fur lined tankist  helmets.  Later he changed from being a tankist to commanding  a S122 in a  self propelled howitzer regiment. With enough of  medium to heavy of these in defense it was  difficult for the enemy to break through

1943 June they were transferred to Kursk. Here the Germans were using Nebelwerfer rocket launches.

Ossetian are Christians in Russia  north of Georgia. The 122nn howitzer could penetrate the Tiger armor. General Rokossovshy was the Central Front Commander. Ponyri. was a big battle in the battle of Kursk. Russian Il 2 planes fought in this.

Russian soldiers would only abandon a tank if it was on fire so so badly damaged it could not shoot or move, otherwise they could be charged for cowardice. The equipment was valued more than the men inside. If you could hit the Tiger under the turret it jammed this and  it lost the ability to turn. The Tiger would then throw out a smoke grenade turn around and retreat. 

 The Russians had dogs trained to go under German tanks and blow them up. This did not always work as the were trained using tanks that looked like German ones but Russian tanks smelt of diesel and German ones smelt of petrol.  The Germans learned  to shoot the dogs.

One tank they  had a Udmurt a Kazakh , an Uzbek and a Ukrainian. Only educated men of other nationalities who spoke Russian well were recruited into the armored corps as they had to think in Russian.

After action you had to take care of the vehicle, refuel , clean components and weapons and check the electrical contacts.

They had lice but unlike with the infantry they were not widespread.  Here they would discard underwear and try get clean underwear if it was replaced by army issue. The front line has its own rules and military hierarchy doesn't exist. Front line fraternity. Each man knew that the others would fight for his like to the very end. at motionless target become enemy prey.

1943 Dnieper River Battles  A 12 year old boy crawled up to their battery from Sal'noya and told them that his family had been killed by the Germans 3 weeks earlier. He informed them that there were large building where the Germans  were storing ammunition.  They moved  their guns to a high point fired 2 well placed shots and quickly returned. The enemy depots burned all night.

To hide from dive bombers the went into a hemp field which was similar color to the armored vehicles. At this stage the replacements were new Russian recruits of 17 years old.

The Russian forces defeated the Germans at Konotop , Ukraine so quickly that the Germans did not have time to blow up the communications centre railway station or pumphouse. They found a German military cemetery with graves in straight lines and crosses on each individual grave.. Russian soldiers were buried in common graves or 20 or even 30 bodies just thrown in.

1943 Nov Kiev. They sent the convoy of tanks , vehicles north at night with darkened lights while at the same time a convey of tractors was sent south with all lights on. When a river was crossed on a ferry you had to be out of the vehicle. In one case a ferry capsized and they managed to rescue someone trapped in a truck. Overt displays of religion were officially banned. Before the war 80% of the population were peasants with there various superstitions.

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The Gun that Changed the World 152pp 2003 23/9/15 by Mikhail Kalashnikov (Author), Andrew Brown (Translator), Elena Joly (Contributor) Born in Kunya 1919 died 2013 Not a well written book but easy reading This is the story about the designer of the gun that changed the world. The AK 47 is on the flag of Mozambique and Hezbollah. Saddam Hussein had a gold plated one. The inventor never had a patent on it and did it for patriotic reasons. You get the accurate single bullet rifle still used today by snipers and then the machine gun which is heavy. This combines both and is light and doesn’t jam with dust or mud. His parents were Kulak's that were deported to Tomsk in Siberia and made a living by farming and hunting thus he learned to use his father's rifle. He returned to their village and became a tractor mechanic, then a tank mechanic and tank commander when conscripted to the army in 1938 Automat Kalashnikov 1947 AK47. Luckily the engineer around him saw the value of his ideas, then competition, then improvements then meeting the big people in the field. His moving from one factory and agency to another and finally settling where his rifle was manufactured. It strikes one that something that the state wants somehow progresses but privately designed products for consumption have no hope of advancement. It also means that the development of something like that cost more that in a free market society. Certain weird thing that the prototypes that were developed were destroyed instead of being kept as research samples. Later when Russia opened up he met the important weapons designer like Stoner of the F16 and Uzi Gal who lived in the States. Over the years he met many of the Russian leaders. The end of the book also describes the break down of the USSR into the mess it is today. The inequality and the lack of purpose for the younger generation. 

"I sleep well it is the politicians that fail to come to an agreement"