On 75th Anniversary Of Defeat Of Nazi Germany In World War 2

Harsh Thakor

ON 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF DEFEAT OF NAZI GERMANY IN WORLD WAR 2 LET US DIP OUR BLOOD IN MEMORY OF THE USSR RED ARMY WHO WERE CRUSADERS IN THE LIBERATION OF MANKIND. NO COUNTRY EVER SINGLEHANDEDLY SAVED THE FATE OF MANKIND AS SOVIET RUSSIA DID HERE.MORALLY USSR WON WORLD WAR 2 TOS AVE THE WORLD PEOPLE FROM THE TYRANNY OF NAZI FASCISM

75TH Anniversary of conclusion World War 2 in which Soviet Russia was the moral winner.

We commemorate the 75th anniversary of the surrender of Nazi Germany in World War 2, who had morally surrendered to the Russian red army on May 2nd. Soviet Russia led by Stalin did not create but saved the new epoch of Socialism defined by Lenin and but for USSR the entire globe would have been enslaved by the tyranny of Nazi fascism. It was the immortal sacrifice of Socialist USSR that principally won the war against the Nazi fascists, with USA and Britain playing a very minimal role in comparison. In the history of man so much pain and suffering has not reached the height of World War 2 or has any nation single-handedly saved the fate of mankind in the history of the world as late USSR did. in World War 2.

Objective historians recount the sequence of events that led to the creation of Hitler,the conspiracies of the Allied powers led by Churchill and Roosevelt to even aid Hitler to destroy USSR and even in the fag end plotting against Soviet Russia. Even non-Marxist historians, anti-Stalinists or liberals acknowledge that it was Soviet Russia who mainly deserve the credit for the victory over the Nazis in the world War .Quite a few historians who condemn Stalin's purges or class him as a dictator hail him and USSR as the saviour of the world masses like Max Hastings, Ishaan Tharoor, Geoffrey Roberts etc. We may refute their evaluation of Stalinist Russia but still have to give them credit for their insightful analysis on Russian war effort.

The Red Army was "the main engine of Nazism's destruction," writes British historian and journalist Max Hastings in "Inferno: The World at War, 1939-1945." The Soviet Union paid the harshest price: though the numbers are not exact, an estimated 26 million Soviet citizens died during World War II, including as many as 11 million soldiers. At the same time, the Germans suffered three-quarters of their wartime losses fighting the Red Army.”

"It was the Western Allies' extreme good fortune that the Russians, and not themselves, paid almost the entire 'butcher's bill' for [defeating Nazi Germany], accepting 95 per cent of the military casualties of the three major powers of the Grand Alliance," writes Hastings.

The epic battles that eventually rolled back the Nazi advance -- the brutal winter siege of Stalingrad, the clash of thousands of armored vehicles at Kursk (the biggest tank battle in history) -- had no parallel on the Western Front, where the Nazis committed fewer military assets. The savagery on display was also of a different degree than that experienced farther west.”(Ishaan Tharoor)

Sadly still a great section of the world population is a slave of the Western propaganda glorifying the role of America or Britain. Historical BBC World War 2 documentaries basically still project Soviet Russia as villains and place untold glory to Battle of Britain, 'D-Day etc. Virtually the figures like Churchill, Roosevelt, General Montgomery or Patton .

The conspiracy the West hatched to overthrow USSR was exposed when it virtually refused to form a second front against Hitler even in 1941.Bourgeois historians treat Stalin as a kind of fascist. and literally describe the Eastern European liberated regions as an 'Iron Curtain."What took place from 1945 was not a Cold War but restructuring the strategy to demolish Socialist Russia. There is proof that Churchill had launched a plan in the early 1940's to achieve this. Even in 1944 Churchill planned a conspiracy against Russia with German commander in Italy Kesselring in the autumn of 1944, Churchill, with full American knowledge, entered into negotiations with the for a separate peace. Stalin came to know of it and questioned Churchill on it. Churchill was obliged to tender an apology, which Stalin accepted. In mid-April 1945 the Nazi generals made a collaboration with Churchill.
I may give the British, French or American soldiers partial credit for anti-fascist spirit or determination but their endurance is not comparable to the Russian red army when entering Berlin in 1945.It was more like giving an icing on the cake created by the Soviet forces.
USSR had no choice but to sign the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact which saved them from an attack by the Imperialist countries or Germany and in no way did it ally with Nazi Germany's war machine. There was an organized international conspiracy with an espionage system even infiltrating USSR to overthrow it.

The USSR Red army blended the tenacity of a boulder resisting a most powerful gale with the planning of an engineer skill of a surgeon and imagination of a painter.
It was the genius of the 5 year plans that laid the ground for USSR to build a strong infrastructure to resist the fascist forces. The Socialist planned economy played a major role in creating the required supplies for a war. The great literacy for the working class played an important role in sharpening their orientation.

The Marxist-Leninist ideological base facilitated non conventional forms of warfare like the guerrilla warfare of the Soviet militias consisting of those without conventional military training. A form of a people’s war was waged dispelling all bourgeois conventions. With untold mastery the Soviets maintained a reserve force to replenish losses and garnered production for the cause of the war. Logistically industries were built to withstand an enemy attack. A form of de-centralization took place during the war which enabled creation of people's militias. Partisan warfare made a great impact. By 1942 10000 people, 250 regional groups and 1013 partisan detachments were formed. Partisans constituted people never previously exposed in military warfare or trained. They made outstanding innovations in implementing people’s war. The young guards made arguably the greatest sacrifices to defeat an enemy in the last century. (From revolutionary journal ‘The Comrade”)

Several Communist party members were sent to the front to infiltrate the enemy and organize resistance in the occupied areas. They played a great supportive role in rebuilding morale of people in starvation affected and besieged cities .They helped the people organize defence and train themselves in fighting. Even non -military elements in cities were trained and mobilised.70% of the party membership and 90% of the kosmosol took part in the resistance Even Western countries could not emulate this whose armies were virtually subdued in the cities. Best displayed in Kiev and Leningrad, Under Stalin's guidance with resolute determination they prevented the Nazi enemy from using any of the nation's resources. They mastered methods of protecting it not giving away even a drop of sand to the enemy. USSR adopted the policy that attack is the best form of defence.

The human spirit for liberation to enslave itself from tyranny rose to metaphysical proportions. There may never have been a better illustration of how liberation struggle was in essence also a spiritual change in man.(From “The Comrade)

What will be always embedded in our minds was the glorious turnabout in Stalingrad where against all odds the red army resurrected itself from the grave to reach the pinnacle of glory. Approaching the Baku oilfields, the German army faced the greatest turnabout in military history like Rome being set on fire. In the Battle of Stalingrad, the German war machine more than met its match. From August-January, the Nazis lost nearly 500,000 troops, which is more than either the British or the Americans lost in the entire war. Stalingrad was the greatest turning point in the history of the world in the last century.

In Leningrad the Soviet people displayed tenacity and resilience as no people ever did From September 8, 1941 to January 27, 1944, nearly 2 ½ years, the city of Leningrad was besieged by the Nazis and placed under a cruel embargo, in what many historians classify as a brutal act of genocide. Of a population of 2.5 million people, only 800,000 survived. Most died from starvation. Others perished from disease and exposure. Even when given the chance to flee, most did not. They would stay and defend their homeland from the fascist invaders.
Who can also forget the red army liberating the concentration camps like Auschwitz camp in 1945 on 27th January and later liberating Eastern Europe? The first of these camps to be liberated were in Poland, beginning with Majdanek in the country’s east in July, 1944, followed by Belzec, Chelmo, Sobibor and Treblinka. On January 27, 1945, the Soviet Red Army liberated the most notorious extermination camp of all, Auschwitz Birkenau. Thousands of Red Army soldiers would die fighting even as they were approaching the camps, fired on by guards who undoubtedly hoped to conceal their crimes against humanity from the rest of the world. Geoffrey Roberts writes in the Irish Examiner, “When it came to describing Majdanek the Soviet writer and journalist, Konstantin Simonov, warned his readers its horrors were beyond human imagination and comprehension; not simply another scene of atrocities but the site of systematic murder on a massive scale.”Significant it was Socialist Russia and not Western democracies that liberated victims of concentration camps inspite of it being tagged as anti-semitic by sections.”

On entering Berlin in April it destroyed the very backbone of the Nazi forces.It was the Soviet capture that instigated Hitler to commit suicide.

The courage of the youth of the Komsomol’s is unprecedented in history of mankind. A most touching 2-part novel, Young guards was written by Alexander Fadeyev depicting the never say die spirit of the Russian youth.

One does not have words to pity the plight of the Soviet prisoners of war who received treatment worse than animals. Soviet Prisoners of War taken by the Germans were subjected to the most horrifyingly depraved treatment imaginable, starved to the point of no recognition. They had to desperately fight for every last scrap of food or water, and in the most extreme circumstances some were driven to cannibalism. 60% of all Soviet POWs captured by Nazis during the war died in captivity (compared with 4% of American and British POWs held captive by the Nazis). Of the 3.3 million POWs who died mainly of starvation, 2 million of them died before February, 1942, 7 months into the war.

Even if I differ with their analysis on Stalin on issues like totally defending purges and not acknowledging his gross errors, I feel progressive forces owe a great deal to the research of the Stalinist Societies in exposing the lies of the Western powers or media and defending USSR as the true liberators. They also hit the Trotskyites ideologically with the sharpest of swords in exposing the counter revolutionary role of Leon Trotsky as an agent of the Nazi fascists. Although a Trotskyite historian Isaac Deutscher defended the heroic role of Soviet Russia.

It is possible that USSR may have taken longer time than they did to defeat Hitler and Axis countries but I have no doubt they could have won the war without Western help. Stalin no doubt played a great role as a leader in shaping the victory displaying nerves of Steel .It is possible that the role of Stalin was over glorified and not given to the Soviet people as a whole as Marshal Zhukov claimed. Earlier Stain did wrongly execute innocent party members, violate mass line and suppress dissent to an extent. Still I doubt very much if any great Leader be it even Lenin or Mao could have handled the situation with such tenacity as Stalin. It was victory for the Socialist state and the Socialist ideology as a whole. Stalin’s lessons are still as relevant to the world today on questions of 'fascism.'

Stalin has been wrongly framed by even democratic sections for wrongly executing army generals. He was simply compelled to eliminate forces that wee virtual agents of the Nazis who were conspiring to overthrow the Soviet state. Quoting Comrade Harpal Brar "Through the military trial of some of the generals and the Moscow trials, the Soviet Union had eliminated those who constituted a fifth column who would have collaborated with the invading Nazis had they been left at large. Far from decimating the Soviet military and political leadership, these trials had strengthened the Soviet armed forces’ will to fight and restored the Communist Party’s unity in the face of deadly enemies. If the Soviet High Command had indeed been decimated, how then was it that the Red Army produced such brilliant and world-renowned generals as Zhukov, Chuikov, Shtemenko, Yaramenko, Timoshenko, Vasilivesky, Sokolovsky, Rokossovsky, Koniev, Voroshilov, Budenny, Mekhlis, Kulik and many others?”

Quoting historian Isaac Deustcher “On 24 June 1945 Stalin stood at the top of the Lenin Mausoleum and reviewed a great victory parade of the Red Army which marked the fourth anniversary of Hitler’s attack. By Stalin’s side stood Marshall Zhukov, his deputy, the victor of Moscow, Stalingrad and Berlin. The troops that marched past him were led by Marshall Rokossovsky. As they marched, rode, and galloped across Red Square, regiments of infantry, cavalry, and tanks swept the mud of its pavement – it was a day of torrential rain – with innumerable banners and standards of Hitler’s army. At the Mausoleum they threw the banners at Stalin’s feet. The allegorical scene was strangely imaginative . . .”. The next day Stalin received the tribute of Moscow for the defence of the city in 1941. The day after he was acclaimed as ‘Hero of the Soviet Union’ and given the title of Generalissimo.”
In “these days of undreamt-of triumph and glory”, continues Deutscher, “Stalin stood in the full blaze of popular recognition and gratitude. These feelings were spontaneous, genuine, not engineered by official propagandists. Overworked slogans about the ‘achievements of the Stalinist era’ now conveyed fresh meaning not only to young people, but to sceptics and malcontents of the older generation”

It is not a sheer coincidence that the Covid -19 crisis is taking place on the 75th anniversary of World War 2 with Neo-fascism at its helm since 1945 as well as world capitalist economic crisis. We have to study the phenomena a of how fascism in Europe emerged in the very first place and the connivance of the Western Imperialist countries. Today a new form of fascism in era of globalisation is at an embryonic stage and only Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideology can counter it at its strongest point. Sadly today we have lost our citadel of a Socialist state. Vietnam ressurected the glory of the Soviet heroes in 1975 and later even if ultimately mutilated Iraq gave strong echoes of Stalingrad when courageously counter attacking America. under Sadam Hussein. Whatever our critique of Islamic fundamentalist forces and its wrong acts in modern times it is the Muslim world who have displayed the greatest defiance to American hegemony. On 75th anniversary of end of World War 2 we are faced with the proposition of defeating the ascendancy of Hindutva fascism which is close to reaching it's boiling point, but lack the leadership of a tightly centralised party like the Communist Party of Soviet Union led by Lenin or Stalin. On the international scale Zionist fascism has Nazi like overtones but no genuine vanguard party to counter it. It is ironical that Mahatma Gandhi treated Adolf Hitler as a friend through his letters before 1941 and wished to appease him, after being hailed as an ‘apostle of; non-violence.’ Gandhi opposed the united anti-fascist resistance be it against Japan or Germany and thus his non violence was cosmetic, having no essence in defeating fascism.

Back to Home Page

May 9, 2020