Chapter 294
For Stalin himself, attacking the Japanese mainland and seizing Hokkaido was obviously tempting. However, he also knew the current state of the Soviet army. Therefore, he accepted the proposal of Vasilevsky and Yuri and defined the military operations in the Far East in the future as strengthening the air force in the coastal area.
Building several forward airports in Primorsky Krai and South Sakhalin was obviously a huge project. Taking Yuri's proposal into consideration and the fact that the Disarmament Commission had already been established, Stalin handed this task over to the Executive Bureau of the Disarmament Commission, with a deadline of no more than one month.
Building a forward airport, even one with basic functions, requires a lot of effort.
Fortunately, today's fighter planes are still propeller-driven, so the runway requirements are not high. During the tense of the Soviet-German War, the Soviet airfields only had runways and basic warehouses, nothing else. As for the runways, they were all compacted dirt roads, and sometimes even flat grass was used.
Of course, the situation is different now. If you simply pursue speed, it is still the fastest to use perforated steel plates. The perforated steel plates produced by the factory are directly pulled over, laid on the flat ground, pieced together, and simply welded. During the Pacific War, the forward airports built by the United States basically used this method.
However, perforated steel plates are also materials after all. Considering the actual situation in the Far East, it is naturally the most effective and economical method to use compacted road surface. After all, what is least lacking there is labor, and millions of prisoners would be wasted.
They used the simplest and most brutal method, using large stones to roller-roll the material over and over again. As for the power to drag the roller, they would use a car if there was one, and if not, they would use prisoners of war. The one-month construction period was actually not tight.
After receiving the order issued by Stalin himself, this small-scale meeting came to an end. Yuri and Antonov walked at the end of the group. He needed to negotiate with Antonov on the location of the forward airport.
Coming out of Stalin's office, Yuri was talking . Just as they were about to reach the stairs, they saw several people in front of them move aside, and Beria, wearing small glasses and with an expressionless face, appeared in the corridor.
At this time, Beria was holding a document in his hand. He seemed to be in a bad mood. He walked very fast. He seemed not to hear others greeting him. He just walked quickly among the crowd and went straight into Stalin's office.
After all, Comrade Beria looked like this most of the time, so the people present didn't pay much attention. After he entered Stalin's office, everyone continued talking and walked downstairs.
After making an appointment with Antonov to meet later, Yuri returned to his office.
In the office, young Comrade Kryuchkov was standing in front of his desk, looking forward. Right in front of him, next to the air conditioner, two young men were fiddling with some tools. It seemed that they came to repair the air conditioner.
Seeing Yuri coming in, Kryuchkov greeted him first, then hurriedly poured him a cup of tea and placed it on the coffee table next to the sofa.
Yuri sat down on the sofa, picked up a pack of cigarettes on the coffee table, took out a cigarette and lit it. He had only taken two puffs when the phone on the desk rang.
Kryuchkov walked quickly over and picked up the receiver.
"Okay... Yes, I'll tell Comrade General," Kryuchkov said after a brief conversation with the person on the other end of the phone. After hanging up the phone, he turned to Yuri and said, "Comrade General, Comrade Nikolai Alexandrovich Bulganin called and said he has something to talk to you about. He will be here in half an hour."
Yuri nodded, wondering why Bulganin came to see him.
The two repairmen quickly fixed the air conditioner. In fact, there was no big problem with it. There was just a problem with the mercury column that adjusted the temperature. It just needed to be replaced.
After the two repairmen left, Yuri returned to his desk and looked at the documents for a while. Then he heard a knock on the door. Then Kryuchkov pushed the door open a crack, poked his head in and said, "Comrade General, Comrade Nikolai Alexandrovich Bulganin is here."
Kryuchkov was of low rank, so when he addressed Bulganin, he naturally had to respectfully use his full name. As for Yuri, he also had to stand up and go to the door to greet him .
However, just as he stood up from his chair and turned around his desk, Bulganin, dressed in a gray Lenin suit, walked into the office.
"What's the urgent matter, Nikolay? Why do you have to come here in person?" Yuri walked up to him, shook hands, asked him to sit down on the sofa, and asked with a smile.
Bulganin had a serious expression on his face. He did not speak. He just put the document in his hand on the coffee table and turned to look at Kryuchkov who was busy pouring water.
Yuri saw that his expression was not right, so he hurriedly drove Kryuchkov out of the office, sat on the sofa next to Bulganin, and asked in a low voice: "What happened?"
After Kryuchkov left and the office door closed, Bulganin unfolded the documents in front of him, took out a manuscript from among them and handed it to Yuri, saying: "The General Political Department is reflecting on the past four years of war. According to the requirements put forward by Comrade Stalin, this work must be true and profound. We should not only consider the results of each battle, but also the process, the losses, and the mistakes, or errors, made by certain commanders in the process of commanding the battles."
Yuri was stunned for a moment. A reflection on the Soviet-German War? He had no idea about this before, and hadn't even heard a whisper. He was the deputy chief of the general staff and also the chief of operations. At the same time, he had been in the frontline command position for more than two years during the entire war. How could such a job be kept secret from him?
Almost subconsciously, Yuri took the manuscript handed to him by Bulganin and looked down.
This manuscript was written on the letterhead of the General Political Department, and the header has the title of the General Political Department.
What surprised Yuri was that there was already an outline of an article on the letter paper.
If the article is written according to this outline, there is no doubt that it will be full of criticism and accusations. The outline starts from 1941. The first part is a targeted criticism of the General Staff’s lack of urgency and failure to make effective preparations for the upcoming war from February to June 1941, that is, the four months before the official outbreak of the Soviet-German War.
The following sections are criticisms of some specific issues during the battles of Leningrad, Moscow, Stalingrad, etc.
As a participant in this war, and a participant who was on the front line most of the time, Yuri had to admit that many of the questions raised were objective.
For example, in the battles of the first year, the Soviet army's offensive formation had big problems. At that time, they were still using the tactics adopted during the civil war, that is, the troops launched the attack in three waves. One wave was a dense skirmish line, followed by several columns providing support, and at the very end was a reserve of company columns.
This kind of offensive formation can often produce miraculous effects when facing weak enemies or enemies with insufficient firepower. It can even defeat the enemy in the process of queue attack simply by relying on momentum.
However, it turned out that this offensive formation was ineffective against the Germans. The Germans’ powerful firepower was able to wipe out the second-tier support troops before the first wave of attacks reached the front of the position. This was one of the important reasons for the low combat capability of the Soviet army before the summer of 1942. Such an important issue should have been raised and corrected earlier, but the Soviet army did not correct this mistake until after the Battle of Moscow.
Looking at the outline of the article in his hand, Yuri's heart sank. He knew very well that the Soviet army had made many mistakes during the entire Soviet-German War. If the responsibility was to be investigated, none of these senior generals would be able to escape. But looking at this outline, the so-called reflection was obviously not intended to be reflected upon by everyone. This outline was a thread that connected it from beginning to end, just like the footprints of a person, and that person was Comrade Zhukov.
Putting down the manuscript in his hand, Yuri wiped his face and turned to look at Bulganin, only to find that he was also looking at him.
"Yuri, this article is best written by you," Bulganin stared at him for a while, and finally a smile appeared on his serious face. He said, "I think you should be fully aware of this."
Sure enough, this was an article targeting Zhukov. Yuri smiled bitterly. He understood what Bulganin meant. It was indeed most appropriate for him to write such an article. Because among the current Soviet senior commanders, if anyone could compete with Zhukov, it would only be him, the youngest general in the history of the Soviet Army.
"The content of the analysis should be more in-depth and detailed," Bulganin continued, "and it should be done as soon as possible. Comrade Stalin hopes to see it in Izvestia the day after tomorrow morning."
Yuri nodded silently. He knew that he was being used as a knife, a knife used by Comrade Stalin to undermine Zhukov's prestige.
How should I put it? Yuri didn't mind hitting the arrogant Comrade Zhukov, after all, the conflict between the two had long been public. But then again, it felt really bad to be a knife to someone, especially when he couldn't refuse.
