Exploring IceBreaker Written by Victor Suvorov - Essay Example

?Please provide the cover sheet given at Arts Central Exploring the Icebreaker Thesis: A Criticism of Suvorov’s Argument Introduction IceBreaker, a book written by Victor Suvorov, discusses one of the most controversial claims in world history: it was Stalin, not Hitler, who triggered the Second World War. According to this account, Hitler was forced to invade Soviet Russia after he learned of Stalin’s plans to attack Nazi Germany. In other words, Hitler only acted violently against Soviet Russia to frustrate Stalin’s plan of invading Germany. The prevailing knowledge is that Nazi Germany unexpectedly and senselessly attacked the unknowingly Soviet Russia on the 22th of June 1941, which eventually became known as Operation Barbarossa. But Victor Suvorov blatantly refuted this knowledge, claiming that Stalin was planning to launch an offensive against Nazi Germany, overrun Western Europe and establish communism in the region.1 Thus, the big question is who really started the Second World War? Is Suvorov’s IceBreaker thesis plausible? In this essay I argue that the IceBreaker thesis is flawed and questionable at best. Overview of the Icebreaker Thesis The interconnected issues of Hitler’s impetus and Stalin’s objective in 1941 became highly controversial due to the Icebreaker thesis of Suvorov. Suvorov claimed that Stalin had dreamed of a large-scale conflict between Western democracies and Germany, that he condoned the eventual accession of Hitler, and that he viewed the hostile approach of Nazi Germany toward Western democracies as the ‘icebreaker’ which would restore revolutionary sentiments all over Europe. Suvorov claims that Stalin planned to attack Nazi Germany in 1941, a move which he expected would expand all over Western Europe and strengthen the expansion of communism all over the region.2 To bolster his argument, Suvorov provides descriptions of a massive number of Soviet tanks and paratroopers. According to Suvorov, this wicked plan was thwarted simply because Nazi Germany detected the Soviet plan sooner and instigated their destructive defensive attack. This German assault was remarkably triumphant, Suvorov claims, for it was able to detect the Soviet plan ahead of time and hence successfully caught them off guard.3 Suvorov’s thesis was in fact originally introduced by Hitler. The declaration of war released by Nazi Germany condemned the alleged Soviet preparations to assault Germany and rationalized the Nazi attack on Soviet Russia as a defensive response. Several scholars may have been astonished by this effort to hold Moscow responsible for the eruption of a full-blown conflict between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia and several who would have accepted it as a fact. In any case, holding his victims responsible for motivating his assault had become Hitler’s modus operandi. For instance, he charged the Holocaust on a suspected global Jewish plot to annihilate the Aryan race.4 Hitler had habitually held his victims responsible to justify his campaigns against them. The Debate Suvorov’s thesis was largely ignored in England, although it received greater recognition in Russia because it demonstrated how Stalin overpowered an enraged and fanatical tyrant.5 Still, the thesis drew the attention of numerous historians. But most historians find the thesis weak and anecdotal. The IceBreaker thesis is in fact fictitious. It is based on incomplete and disconnected sets of evidence. When it is analysed against authentic documents that summarise the dishevelled and hopeless condition of the Red Army in 1941, the thesis becomes implausible. However, there are still those who find the thesis credible. For instance, the IceBreaker thesis is somewhat encouraging for German historians nowadays for it somehow vindicate Nazi Germany for attacking Soviet Russia and, consequently, setting alight the Second World War. This thesis has been embraced by several Russian and German historians who are eager to hold Stalin responsible for all the evil deeds that were perpetrated throughout the period. 6 Despite of the obvious limitations and flaws of the Icebreaker thesis and the contemptuous disapproval which it has received from numerous historians, several scholars in North America and Western Europe have supported Suvorov’s story. Walter Post, a German historian, stresses that Stalin, as well as Lenin, had plotted to instigate a military campaign against capitalist monopolies. He bases this assumption on different ideological or philosophical statements by Bolshevik rulers. Moreover, he argues that the Fuhrer decided to approach Soviet Russia aggressively when he discovered this alarming danger to Nazi Germany.7 Another German historian, Joachim Hoffmann, believes that Stalin did not consider the gravity of a German assault provided that England stayed invincible. Hence confident, Stalin allegedly mobilized his army in an offensive manner, specifically, a revolutionary struggle for freedom all over Europe. Although there were increasing proofs of a German assault, Soviet Russia, obstructed by too much assurance and revolutionary commitment, refused to modify its offensive operations and thus putting the nation into too much peril and destruction.8 Ernst Topitsch, an Austrian historian, also supported Suvorov’s thesis. He claims: Hitler and Nazi Germany forfeit their position at the centre of the stage and make only episodic appearances—chess pieces rather than players—forming part of a long-term strategy already conceived by Lenin which aimed at the subjugation of the ‘capitalist world.’9 Topitsch further highlights the major contribution and remarkable capacity of Stalin shown throughout the Second World War and denounces the forethought and contribution of Hitler. Topitsch claimed that his intention in developing an argument like that of the Icebreaker thesis was not absolve Hitler but instead to place the Fuhrer at his genuine rational and political standing and to rectify the generally embraced misjudged description of his skills and intellect. According to Topitsch, Stalin had taken advantage of and manipulated the weak spots of Hitler to set off the Second World War.10 The Austrian historian further claims that after the termination of the Nazi-Soviet Pact, Hitler became Stalin’s victim, who used him to conquer France and expel the British from Europe.11 Evidently, from Topitsch point of view, it was Stalin who orchestrated World War II, and not Hitler. However, examined thoroughly and cross-referenced with genuine historical documents, the Icebreaker thesis becomes clearly implausible. The most extensively cited and seminal expert investigations of Soviet foreign policy debunk the Icebreaker thesis. Western historians, who studied Soviet war campaigns, also denounced Suvorov’s argument. Jonathan House and David Glantz assert that, “... the Soviet Union was not ready for war in June 1941, nor did it intend, as some have contended, to launch a preventative war.”12 Glantz, in particular, viewed Suvorov’s argument about the plan of Soviet Russia in 1941 hard to believe due to his mishandling and misinterpretation of largely dubious archival documents. Eventually, the pre-emptive war theory of Suvorov was also discredited by contemporary German historians. One of these German historians who detest Suvorov’s argument is Gerhard Weinberg. According to him, “... the decision [to attack Russia] grew not out of either some possibly remediable circumstance of the moment, or a sense of being threatened, but out of purposeful determination. This [i.e., the destruction of the USSR] was what had in general always been intended, as a central project of the whole system, and without it the National Socialist experiment made no sense.”13 All of these Western historians swiftly denounced the Icebreaker thesis due to inadequate or poor research derived from questionable and subjective sources. Several major studies by Western historians have been publicised in recent times which forcefully dispute the Suvorov thesis. Cynthia Roberts, for instance, looks at the weaknesses of the strategic preparation and forecasting of Soviet Russia. Soviet leaders thought that their guarding soldiers along the perimeter have the capability to delay enemy assaults effectively that will consequently give them enough time to initiate strong defences and continue the battle against the enemy’s lands. Because of this assumption, the biggest portion of the Red Army was placed near at the perimeter and mobilised offensively rather than defensively.14 According to Suvorov this Soviet strategy, particularly the forward positioning of the finest soldiers of the Red Army, is proof of Stalin’s goal of kicking off a revolutionary campaign, but Roberts explains that these mobilisations and positioning were derived from flawed strategic assumption and that they resulted immediately in the catastrophes of 1941.15 Apparently, those who supported the Suvorov thesis have their subjective interpretation or personal agenda (e.g. Russian and German) whereas those who criticised the theory are more objective. The Icebreaker thesis has been discredited by highly regarded historians and willingly supported by several groups, such as the neo-Nazis and the Russian Israelis.16 For several Russian historians the appeal of the theory could emanate from the desire to ridicule every facet of the detested Soviet history; for several German historians it could be the need to rationalise German aggression and the unspeakable atrocities it involved during the Second World War; and for a very few American historians it could be the unwillingness to set free a much-loved enemy.17 On the contrary, more objective historians tried to challenge the controversial Suvorov thesis. According to them, a major weakness in Suvorov thesis is that it misjudged the abilities of Soviet Russia: Stalin was not invincible or all-knowing; Soviet Russia often had to act in response to intimidations from a relatively disadvantaged position. Thus, most historians concluded that the Icebreaker thesis is a terrible piece of journalism. Suvorov rarely backs up his revelations with trustworthy or genuine historical materials. Rather, he claims what he believes would have been the single appropriate defensive tactic for Soviet Russia in 1941. Suvorov also views the critical concepts, such as ‘offensive’ and ‘defensive’, as though they were incompatible; specifically, any mobilisation, deployment, or warhead should only be either for ‘defence’ or ‘offence’.18 Furthermore, he argues that Stalin plotted to set off this revolutionary campaign on the 6th of July 1941. This attack would not have taken place after the German forces had drained its military resources, but instead when Nazi Germany was at the zenith of its rule. There is also no evidence that the people of Western and Central Europe were ready for a revolutionary campaign in 1941.19 Evidently, Suvorov lacks proper documentation that strongly discloses the intent of Stalin. It has been confirmed that there are no archival materials or contemporary sources that explain or reveal Stalin’s true intention. How could the Soviet forces, more particularly the Red Army, a strong military unit, be enormously devastated by German forces in 1941, particularly when reliable indications of the imminent attack was abundant? Until now, historians are having problems explaining this tragedy. Many accounts have placed emphasis on the poor situation of the Red Army and on Stalin’s almost lethal self-denial. Even though he definitely understood that that Nazi-Soviet Pact was merely a short-term ceasefire prior to an unavoidable Nazi assault, Stalin deceived himself that there was still a chance to pacify Hitler until the Red Army had became sufficiently powerful to confront the German attack. Political scholars normally view every nation as a rational unit attempting to take full advantage of its self-interest in global politics.20 Nevertheless, the catastrophe which the Soviet Russia endured in 1941 does not, to a certain extent, fit the rational theory. Thus, the controversial question remains unsolved: why did an extremely suspicious Stalin respond quite recklessly in spite of such serious warnings? Conclusions This essay tries to show that the Icebreaker thesis is implausible. As mentioned in the above discussions most historians criticised the thesis due to major methodological limitations. They describe Suvorov’s narrative as ‘poor journalism’. Existing historical documents do not confirm the allegation that Stalin orchestrated World War II, or, that Hitler only attacked Stalinist Russia for pre-emptive purposes. Looking at how Suvorov answers this question and how reputable historians attempt persistently to find a definitive answer reveals the superiority of the latter’s methodology over Suvorov’s. Controversies in history, like who began World War II, require a continuous search for the truth and not a half-hearted attempt to subjectively interpret historical materials. Bibliography Glantz, David & House, Jonathan. When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler. Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1995. Higham, Robin & Kagan, Frederick. The Military History of the Soviet Union. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. Lane, Peter & Marcello, Ronald. Warriors and Scholars: A Modern War Reader. Denton, TX: University of North Texas Press, 2005. MacKenzie, David & Curran, Michael. A history of Russia, the Soviet Union, and beyond. New York: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2002. Pons, Silvio. Stalin and the Inevitable War, 1936-1941. London: Routledge, 2002. Porter, T.E. ‘Hitler’s Rassenkampf in the East: The Forgotten Genocide’. Nationalities Papers, vol. 37, no. 2 (2009), pp. 839-856. Schulman, A. ‘Testing Ideology against Neorealism in Hitler’s Drive to the East’. Comparative Strategy, vol. 25, no. 1 (2006), pp. 33-54. Shore, Zachary. What Hitler Knew: The Battle for Information in Nazi Foreign Policy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Uldricks, T. ‘The Icebreaker Controversy: Did Stalin Plan to Attack Hitler?’ Slavic Review, vol. 58, no. 3 (1999), pp. 626-643. Zuckermann, Moshe. Ethnizitat, Moderne und Enttraditionalisierung. Germany: Wallstein Verlag, 2002. Read More