Overview
Using newly released Soviet documents and reevaluating existing material, The Chief Culprit analyzes Joseph Stalin's strategic design to conquer Europe and his support for Germany, which helped bring Hitler to power and sustained him. Stalin's strategy leading up to World War II grew from Vladimir Lenin's belief that if World War I did not ignite the worldwide Communist revolution, then a second world war would be needed to achieve it. Stalin saw Germany as the power that would fight and weaken capitalist countries so Soviet armies could sweep across the European continent to the Atlantic. Viktor Suvorov reveals how Stalin conspired with German leaders to bypass the Versailles Treaty, which forbade German rearmament. Secretly, the Soviet Union trained German engineers and officers as well as provided bases and factories for war. In 1939, the nonaggression pact between the Soviet Union and Germany allowed Hitler to proceed with his plans to invade Poland, fomenting war in Europe. Stalin emerges as a diabolical genius consumed by visions of a worldwide Communist revolution at any cost, the leader who wooed Hitler and Germany in his own effort to conquer the world. The author debunks the myth that the Soviet Union was a victim of Germany's aggression. Instead, he insists that Stalin neither feared Hitler nor mistakenly trusted him. Suvorov argues that after Germany occupied Poland, defeated France, and started to prepare for an invasion of Great Britain, Hitler's intelligence services detected the Soviet Unions preparations for a major war against Germany. In 1940, Germany drafted a preemptive war plan, which it launched in June 1941, the invasion of the USSR.
Synopsis
Using newly released Soviet documents and reevaluating existing material, The Chief Culprit analyzes Joseph Stalin's strategic design to conquer Europe and his support for Germany, which helped bring Hitler to power and sustained him. Stalin's strategy leading up to World War II grew from Vladimir Lenin's belief that if World War I did not ignite the worldwide Communist revolution, then a second world war would be needed to achieve it. Stalin saw Germany as the power that would fight and weaken capitalist countries so Soviet armies could sweep across the European continent to the Atlantic. Viktor Suvorov reveals how Stalin conspired with German leaders to bypass the Versailles Treaty, which forbade German rearmament. Secretly, the Soviet Union trained German engineers and officers as well as provided bases and factories for war. In 1939, the nonaggression pact between the Soviet Union and Germany allowed Hitler to proceed with his plans to invade Poland, fomenting war in Europe. Stalin emerges as a diabolical genius consumed by visions of a worldwide Communist revolution at any cost, the leader who wooed Hitler and Germany in his own effort to conquer the world. The author debunks the myth that the Soviet Union was a victim of Germany's aggression. Instead, he insists that Stalin neither feared Hitler nor mistakenly trusted him. Suvorov argues that after Germany occupied Poland, defeated France, and started to prepare for an invasion of Great Britain, Hitler's intelligence services detected the Soviet Unions preparations for a major war against Germany. In 1940, Germany drafted a preemptive war plan, which it launched in June 1941, the invasion of the USSR.
Harry Willems - Library Journal
Suvorov, a former Soviet army officer who defected to the UK in 1978, writes in his acknowledgments, "It quickly became apparent that the Western academic community was reluctant as the Communist propaganda apparatus to accept my new interpretation of the cause of World War II." Historians know that the victors write history, but they also know that interpretations of events change over time. Suvorov's thesis is that Soviet Russia bankrolled Hitler's rise to power as a catalyst for European war, strife, and dislocation, intended as a precursor to a Communist revolution throughout Europe. He spends 350 pages offering circumstantial evidence, rewriting prevailing thought about the causes of World War II. For example, he addresses the Soviet massing of troops on its western border: if it were defensive, they would have dug foxholes and spread out defensively, yet reconnaissance photos from German archives show the Soviet troops in marching order. Stalin was about to invade Germany when Hitler surprised him and attacked Russia. According to Suvorov, that sealed the warrant for the demise of the Soviet Union nearly 50 years later, because communism would simply implode without expansion. This is a thought-provoking read that would be best understood by historians and academics.
Editorials
Library Journal
Suvorov, a former Soviet army officer who defected to the UK in 1978, writes in his acknowledgments, "It quickly became apparent that the Western academic community was reluctant as the Communist propaganda apparatus to accept my new interpretation of the cause of World War II." Historians know that the victors write history, but they also know that interpretations of events change over time. Suvorov's thesis is that Soviet Russia bankrolled Hitler's rise to power as a catalyst for European war, strife, and dislocation, intended as a precursor to a Communist revolution throughout Europe. He spends 350 pages offering circumstantial evidence, rewriting prevailing thought about the causes of World War II. For example, he addresses the Soviet massing of troops on its western border: if it were defensive, they would have dug foxholes and spread out defensively, yet reconnaissance photos from German archives show the Soviet troops in marching order. Stalin was about to invade Germany when Hitler surprised him and attacked Russia. According to Suvorov, that sealed the warrant for the demise of the Soviet Union nearly 50 years later, because communism would simply implode without expansion. This is a thought-provoking read that would be best understood by historians and academics.
—Harry Willems