Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption Semyon Timoshenko and Georgy Zhukov knew everything, but took the secrets to the grave

Until the very beginning of the war and in the first hours after it, Joseph Stalin did not believe in the possibility of a German attack.

The fact that the Germans were crossing the border and bombing Soviet cities, he learned at about 4 am on June 22 from the Chief of the General Staff Georgy Zhukov.

According to Zhukovsky's "Memoirs and Reflections", the leader did not react to what he heard, but only breathed heavily into the phone, and after a long pause, he limited himself to telling Zhukov and People's Commissar of Defense Semyon Timoshenko to go to a meeting in the Kremlin.

In a prepared but undelivered speech at a plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU in May 1956, Zhukov claimed that Stalin forbade opening fire on the enemy.

At the same time, in May-June, Stalin secretly transferred 939 echelons with troops and equipment to the western border, called up 801,000 reservists from the reserve under the guise of training camps, and on June 19, by secret order, reorganized the border military districts into fronts, which was always done and only a few days before. start of hostilities.

"The transfer of troops was planned with the expectation that the concentration would be completed from June 1 to July 10, 1941. The offensive nature of the planned actions influenced the disposition of the troops," the collective monograph "1941 - Lessons and Conclusions" published by the Russian Ministry of Defense in 1992 says.

A legitimate question arises: what is the reason for the tragedy of June 22? Usually referred to as "mistakes" and "miscalculations" of the Soviet leadership. But on closer examination, some of them turn out to be not naive delusions, but the result of well-thought-out measures in order to prepare a preemptive strike and subsequent offensive actions Vladimir Danilov, historian

"There was surprise, but only tactical. Hitler was ahead of us!" - said Vyacheslav Molotov to the writer Ivan Stadnyuk in the 1970s.

"The trouble was not in our lack of plans - we had plans! - but in the fact that the suddenly changed situation did not allow them to be carried out," Marshal Alexander Vasilevsky reported in an article written for the 20th anniversary of the Victory, but which was published only at the beginning of 90 -X.

Not the "traitor Rezun", but the president of the Academy of Military Sciences, General of the Army Mahmud Gareev, pointed out: "If there were plans for defensive operations, then the groupings of forces and means would be located in a completely different way, management and echeloning of material reserves would be built differently. But this was not done in the border military districts".

“Stalin’s main miscalculation and his fault was not that the country was not prepared for defense (it was not preparing for it), but that it was not possible to accurately determine the moment. A preemptive strike would have saved our Fatherland millions of lives and, possibly, would have led much earlier to the same political results that the country, ruined, hungry, having lost the color of the nation, came in 1945,” said Academician Andrei Sakharov, director of the Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Clearly aware of the inevitability of a collision with Germany, the leadership of the USSR until June 22, 1941 did not see itself as a victim, did not guess with a beating heart "they will attack - they will not attack", but worked hard to start a war at a favorable moment and conduct it "small blood on foreign soil." Most researchers agree with this. The difference is in details, dates and, mainly, in moral assessments.

Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption The war broke out unexpectedly, although foreboding was in the air

On this tragic day, on the eve and immediately after it, amazing things happened that did not fit into either the logic of preparing for defense or the logic of preparing for an offensive.

There is no explanation based on documents and testimonies of participants in the events, and it is unlikely that one will appear. There are only more or less plausible guesses and versions.

Stalin's dream

Around midnight on June 22, having agreed and allowed Timoshenko and Zhukov to send a controversial document known as "Directive No. 1" to the border districts for their signatures, the leader left the Kremlin for the Middle Dacha.

When Zhukov called with a message about the attack, the guard said that Stalin was sleeping and did not order to wake himself, so the chief of the general staff had to shout at him.

The widespread opinion that the USSR waited for an attack by the enemy, and only then planned an offensive, does not take into account that in this case the strategic initiative would be given into the hands of the enemy, and the Soviet troops were placed in deliberately unfavorable conditions Mikhail Meltyukhov, historian

Saturday, June 21, passed in incredible tension. From the border there were reports that the approaching roar of engines was coming from the German side.

After the Führer's order was read to the German soldiers before the formation at 13:00, two or three communist defectors swam across the Bug to warn the "kamaraden": it would begin tonight. By the way, another mystery is that we do not know anything about these people who should have become heroes in the USSR and the GDR.

Stalin spent the day in the Kremlin in the company of Timoshenko, Zhukov, Molotov, Beria, Malenkov and Mekhlis, analyzing the incoming information and discussing what to do.

Suppose he doubted the data he received and did not take concrete steps. But how could one go to bed without waiting for the denouement when the clock was counting? Moreover, a person who had the habit of working until dawn and sleeping until lunch even in a casual, calm atmosphere?

Plan and directive

at the headquarters Soviet troops in the western direction, up to and including divisions, there were detailed and clear cover plans that were kept in "red packets" and were subject to execution upon receipt of the corresponding order of the people's commissar of defense.

Cover plans are different from strategic military plans. This is a set of measures to ensure the mobilization, concentration and deployment of the main forces in the event of a threat of a preemptive attack by the enemy (occupation of fortifications by personnel, the advancement of artillery to tank-prone areas, the rise of aviation and air defense units, and the activation of reconnaissance).

The introduction of a cover plan is not yet a war, but a combat alert.

During the one and a half hour meeting that began at 20:50 on June 21, Stalin did not allow Timoshenko and Zhukov to take this necessary and obvious step.

The directive completely confused the troops on the border Konstantin Pleshakov, historian

In return, the famous "Directive No. 1" was sent to the border districts, which, in particular, stated: "During June 22-23, a surprise attack by the Germans is possible. The task of our troops is not to succumb to any provocative actions […] at the same time be in in full combat readiness to meet a possible strike […] other measures should not be carried out without a special order.

How can you "meet the blow" without carrying out the activities provided for by the cover plan? How to distinguish a provocation from an attack?

Belated mobilization

Unbelievable, but true: general mobilization in the USSR was not announced on the day the war began, but only on June 23, despite the fact that every hour of delay gave the enemy additional advantages.

The corresponding telegram from the people's commissar of defense was received by the Central Telegraph Office at 16:40 on June 22, although since early morning the leadership of the state, perhaps, had no more pressing task.

At the same time, a short text of only three sentences, written in dry clerical language, did not contain a word about a treacherous attack, defense of the homeland and sacred duty, as if it were a routine call.

Theatrical and concert evening

The command of the Western Special Military District (by that time, in fact, the Western Front), headed by General of the Army Dmitry Pavlov, spent Saturday evening in the Minsk House of Officers at the performance of the operetta "Wedding in Malinovka".

Memoir literature confirms that the phenomenon was massive and ubiquitous. It is hard to imagine that the big commanders in that atmosphere would unanimously go to have fun without instructions from above.

There are numerous testimonies about the cancellation on June 20-21 of earlier orders to increase combat readiness, the unexpected announcement of days off, and the sending of anti-aircraft artillery to training camps.

The anti-aircraft divisions of the 4th Army and the 6th Mechanized Corps of the Western OVO met the war at a training ground 120 km east of Minsk.

Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky was completely bewildered by orders to the troops to send artillery to the firing ranges and other instructions that were ridiculous in that situation.

“On Sunday, the regiment was declared a day off. Everyone was happy: they didn’t rest for three months. On Saturday evening, the command, pilots and technicians left for their families,” recalled former pilot of the 13th bomber regiment Pavel Tsupko.

On June 20, the commander of one of the three ZapOVO air divisions, Nikolai Belov, received an order from the district air force commander to put the division on alert, cancel vacations and dismissals, disperse equipment, and at 16:00 on June 21, it was canceled.

“Stalin sought by the very state and behavior of the troops of the border districts to make it clear that calm reigns here, if not carelessness. As a result, instead of misleading the aggressor with skillful disinformation actions about the combat readiness of our troops, we actually reduced it to extremely low degrees," the former head of the operational department of the headquarters of the 13th Army, Sergei Ivanov, was perplexed.

The ill-fated regiment

But the most incredible story happened in the 122nd Fighter Aviation Regiment, which covered Grodno.

On Friday, June 20, high ranks from Moscow and Minsk arrived at the unit, and at 6 pm on Saturday, an order was announced to the personnel: to remove weapons and ammunition from I-16 fighters and send weapons and ammunition to the warehouse.

Image copyright RIA Novosti Image caption It took several hours to reinstall the removed machine guns on the I-16

The order was so wild and inexplicable that the pilots started talking about treason, but they were silenced.

Needless to say, the next morning the 122nd Air Regiment was completely destroyed.

The grouping of the Soviet Air Force in the western direction consisted of 111 air regiments, including 52 fighter regiments. Why did this one get so much attention?

What happened?

"Stalin, contrary to the obvious facts, believed that this was not yet a war, but a provocation by individual undisciplined units of the German army," Nikita Khrushchev said in a report at the 20th Congress of the CPSU.

The obsessive thought of some kind of provocation, apparently, was indeed present in Stalin's mind. He developed it both in "Directive No. 1" and at the first meeting in the Kremlin after the start of the invasion, which opened at 05:45 on June 22. Until 06:30, he did not give permission to return fire, until Molotov announced that Germany had officially declared war on the USSR.

The late St. Petersburg historian Igor Bunich claimed that a few days before the start of the war, Hitler sent Stalin a secret personal message warning that some Anglophilizing generals might try to provoke a conflict between the USSR and Germany.

Stalin allegedly remarked to Beria with satisfaction that, they say, this is impossible with us, we have put things in order in our army.

True, it was not possible to find a document in the German or Soviet archives.

Israeli researcher Gabriel Gorodetsky explains Stalin's actions with panic fear and a desire not to give Hitler a reason for aggression at any cost.

Stalin really drove every thought from himself, but not about the war (he didn’t think about anything else), but about the fact that Hitler at the very last moment would be able to get ahead of him Mark Solonin, historian

"Stalin drove away any thought of war, he lost the initiative and was practically paralyzed," writes Gorodetsky.

Opponents object that Stalin was not afraid in November 1940, through the mouth of Molotov, to firmly demand Finland, Southern Bukovina and the base in the Dardanelles from Berlin, and in early April 1941 to conclude an agreement with Yugoslavia that enraged Hitler and at the same time had no practical meaning.

A demonstration of defensive preparations, however, cannot provoke a potential enemy, but can make one think again.

“When dealing with a dangerous enemy, you should probably show him, first of all, your readiness to fight back. If we had demonstrated our true power to Hitler, he might have refrained from war with the USSR at that moment,” the experienced staff officer believed Sergei Ivanov, who later rose to the rank of Army General.

According to Alexander Osokin, Stalin, on the contrary, deliberately encouraged Germany to attack in order to appear in the eyes of the world as a victim of aggression and receive American help.

Critics point out that the game in this case turned out to be painfully dangerous, Lend-Lease did not have a self-contained value in Stalin's eyes, and Roosevelt was guided not by the kindergarten principle "who started it?", but by the interests of US national security.

Shoot first

Another hypothesis was put forward by historians Keistut Zakoretsky and Mark Solonin.

During the first three weeks of June, Timoshenko and Zhukov met with Stalin seven times.

According to Zhukov, they called for immediately bringing the troops into some incomprehensible "state of full readiness for war" (preparation was already carried out continuously and at the limit of strength), and, according to a number of modern researchers, to deliver a preemptive strike without waiting for the completion of the strategic deployment .

Truth is stranger than fiction, because fiction has to stay within the bounds of the probable, but truth doesn't Mark Twain

Zakoretsky and Solonin believe that in the face of the obvious aggressive intentions of Berlin, Stalin did listen to the military.

Presumably, at a meeting on June 18 with the participation of Timoshenko, Zhukov, Molotov and Malenkov, it was decided to start a preventive war not sometime, but June 22, the longest day of the year. Only not at dawn, but later.

The war with Finland was preceded by. According to researchers, the war with Germany should also have started with a provocation - a raid by several Junkers and Dorniers bought from the Germans on Grodno. At the hour when residents have breakfast and take to the streets and parks to relax after a week of work.

The propaganda effect would have been deafening, and Stalin could well have sacrificed several dozen civilians in the higher interests.

The version quite logically explains almost everything.

And Stalin's refusal to believe that the Germans would strike almost simultaneously (such coincidences simply do not happen, and what Hitler intends to do in the following days is no longer important).

And the beginning of mobilization on Monday (the decree was prepared in advance, but they did not bother to redo it in the confusion of the first morning of the war).

There are two wills in the field Russian proverb

And the disarmament of the fighters based near Grodno (so that one of the "vultures" is not inadvertently shot down over Soviet territory).

Deliberate complacency made the fascist cunning even more flagrant. The bombs were supposed to fall on a peaceful Soviet city in the midst of complete prosperity. Contrary to popular belief, the demonstration was not addressed to the Germans, but to their own citizens.

It also becomes clear that Stalin did not want to blur the effect by putting the cover plan into action ahead of time.

Unfortunately for the USSR, the aggression turned out to be real.

However, this is only a hypothesis, which the authors themselves emphasize.

22nd of June. Ordinary Sunday. More than 200 million citizens are planning how to spend their day off: go on a visit, take their children to the zoo, someone is in a hurry to play football, someone is on a date. Soon they will become heroes and victims of the war, killed and wounded, soldiers and refugees, blockade runners and prisoners of concentration camps, partisans, prisoners of war, orphans, and invalids. Winners and veterans of the Great Patriotic War. But none of them know about it yet.

In 1941 Soviet Union quite firmly on his feet - industrialization and collectivization bore fruit, the industry developed - out of ten tractors produced in the world, four were Soviet-made. Dneproges and Magnitogorsk have been built, the army is being re-equipped - the famous T-34 tank, Yak-1, MIG-3 fighters, Il-2 attack aircraft, Pe-2 bomber have already entered service with the Red Army. The situation in the world is restless, but Soviet people sure that "the armor is strong and our tanks are fast." In addition, two years ago, after three-hour talks in Moscow, USSR People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Molotov and German Foreign Minister Ribbentrop signed a 10-year non-aggression pact.

After the abnormally cold winter of 1940-1941. A rather warm summer has come to Moscow. Amusements operate in the Gorky Park, football matches are held at the Dynamo stadium. The Mosfilm film studio is preparing the main premiere of the summer of 1941 - the editing of the lyrical comedy Hearts of Four, which will be released only in 1945, has just been completed here. Starring the favorite of Joseph Stalin and all Soviet moviegoers, actress Valentina Serova.

June, 1941 Astrakhan. Near the village of Liney

1941 Astrakhan. On the Caspian Sea

July 1, 1940 A scene from the film "My Love" directed by Vladimir Korsh-Sablin. In the center, actress Lidia Smirnova as Shurochka

April, 1941 Peasant greets the first Soviet tractor

July 12, 1940 Residents of Uzbekistan work on the construction of a section of the Great Fergana Canal

August 9, 1940 Byelorussian SSR. Collective farmers of the village of Tonezh, Turovsky district, Polesye region, for a walk after a hard day's work

May 05, 1941 Kliment Voroshilov, Mikhail Kalinin, Anastas Mikoyan, Andrey Andreev, Alexander Shcherbakov, Georgy Malenkov, Semyon Timoshenko, Georgy Zhukov, Andrey Eremenko, Semyon Budyonny, Nikolai Bulganin, Lazar Kaganovich and others in the presidium of the ceremonial meeting dedicated to graduation commanders who graduated from military academies. Joseph Stalin speaking

June 1, 1940. Classes in civil defense in the village of Dikanka. Ukraine, Poltava region

In the spring and summer of 1941, exercises of the Soviet military began to be carried out more and more often on the western borders of the USSR. War is already in full swing in Europe. Rumors reach the Soviet leadership that Germany could attack at any moment. But such messages are often ignored, since a non-aggression pact was signed just recently.
August 20, 1940 Villagers talking to tankmen during military exercises

"Higher, higher and higher
We strive for the flight of our birds,
And breathes in every propeller
The tranquility of our borders."

Soviet song, better known as "March of the Aviators"

June 1, 1941. An I-16 fighter is suspended under the wing of a TB-3 aircraft, under the wing of which a high-explosive bomb weighing 250 kg

September 28, 1939 People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov and German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop shake hands after the signing of the joint Soviet-German treaty "On Friendship and Borders"

Field Marshal V. Keitel, Colonel General V. von Brauchitsch, A. Hitler, Colonel General F. Halder (left to right in the foreground) near the table with a map during a meeting of the General Staff. In 1940, Adolf Hitler signed General Directive No. 21 under code name"Barbarossa"

On June 17, 1941, V.N. Merkulov sent an intelligence message received by the NKGB of the USSR from Berlin to I.V. Stalin and V.M. Molotov:

“A source working at the headquarters of the German aviation reports:
1. All German military measures to prepare for an armed uprising against the USSR have been completely completed, and a strike can be expected at any time.

2. In the circles of the aviation headquarters, the TASS message of June 6 was perceived very ironically. They emphasize that this statement cannot have any meaning ... "

There is a resolution (regarding 2 points): “To Comrade Merkulov. You can send your "source" from the headquarters of the German aviation to the fucking mother. This is not a "source", but a disinformer. I. Stalin»

July 1, 1940. Marshal Semyon Timoshenko (right), General of the Army Georgy Zhukov (left) and General of the Army Kirill Meretskov (2nd from left) during an exercise in the 99th Rifle Division of the Kiev Special Military District

June 21, 21:00

At the site of the Sokal commandant’s office, he was detained German soldier Corporal Alfred Liskoff, who swam across the Bug River.

From the testimony of the head of the 90th border detachment, Major Bychkovsky:“In view of the fact that the interpreters in the detachment are weak, I called a teacher from the city German language... and Liskof repeated the same thing again, that is, that the Germans were preparing to attack the USSR at dawn on June 22, 1941 ... Without finishing the interrogation of the soldier, he heard strong artillery fire in the direction of Ustilug (the first commandant's office). I realized that it was the Germans who opened fire on our territory, which was immediately confirmed by the interrogated soldier. I immediately began to call the commandant by phone, but the connection was broken.

21:30

In Moscow, a conversation took place between People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Molotov and German Ambassador Schulenburg. Molotov protested in connection with the numerous violations of the borders of the USSR by German aircraft. Schulenburg evaded answering.

From the memoirs of Corporal Hans Teuchler:“At 22 o’clock we were lined up and the order of the Fuhrer was read out. Finally, they told us directly why we are here. Not at all for a rush to Persia to punish the British with the permission of the Russians. And not in order to lull the vigilance of the British, and then quickly transfer troops to the English Channel and land in England. No. We - soldiers of the Great Reich - are waiting for a war with the Soviet Union itself. But there is no such force that could hold back the movement of our armies. For the Russians it will be a real war, for us it will be just a victory. We will pray for her."

June 22, 00:30

Directive No. 1 was sent to the districts, containing an order to covertly occupy firing points on the border, not to succumb to provocations and put the troops on alert.

From the memoirs of the German General Heinz Guderian:“On the fateful day of June 22 at 2:10 in the morning, I went to the command post of the group ...
At 03:15 our artillery preparation began.
At 0340 hours - the first raid of our dive bombers.
At 4:15 a.m., the crossing over the Bug began.

03:07

The commander of the Black Sea Fleet, Admiral Oktyabrsky, called the Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army Georgy Zhukov and said that a large number of unknown aircraft were approaching from the sea; The fleet is in full combat readiness. The admiral offered to meet them with fleet air defense fire. He was instructed: "Act and report to your people's commissar."

03:30

Chief of Staff of the Western District, Major General Vladimir Klimovskikh, reported on a German air raid on the cities of Belarus. Three minutes later, the chief of staff of the Kiev district, General Purkaev, reported on an air raid on the cities of Ukraine. At 03:40, the commander of the Baltic District, General Kuznetsov, reported a raid on Kaunas and other cities.

From the memoirs of I. I. Geibo, deputy regiment commander of the 46th IAP, ZapVO:“... My chest went cold. In front of me are four twin-engine bombers with black crosses on their wings. I even bit my lip. Why, these are Junkers! German Ju-88 bombers! What to do? .. Another thought arose: "Today is Sunday, and on Sundays the Germans do not have training flights." So it's a war? Yes, war!

03:40

People's Commissar of Defense Timoshenko asks Zhukov to report to Stalin about the start of hostilities. Stalin responded by ordering all members of the Politburo to gather in the Kremlin. At that moment, Brest, Grodno, Lida, Kobrin, Slonim, Baranovich, Bobruisk, Volkovysk, Kyiv, Zhytomyr, Sevastopol, Riga, Vindava, Libava, Siauliai, Kaunas, Vilnius and many other cities were bombed.

From the memoirs of Alevtina Kotik, born in 1925 (Lithuania):“I woke up from the fact that I hit my head on the bed - the ground shook from falling bombs. I ran to my parents. Dad said: “The war has begun. We have to get out of here!” We did not know with whom the war started, we did not think about it, it was just very scary. Dad was a military man, and therefore he was able to call a car for us, which took us to the railway station. They took only clothes with them. All furniture and household utensils remained. At first we rode on a freight train. I remember how my mother covered me and my brother with her body, then they transferred to a passenger train. The fact that the war with Germany, they learned somewhere around 12 noon from people they met. Near the city of Siauliai, we saw a large number of wounded, stretchers, doctors.

At the same time, the Belostok-Minsk battle began, as a result of which the main forces of the Soviet Western Front were surrounded and defeated. German troops captured a significant part of Belarus and advanced to a depth of over 300 km. On the part of the Soviet Union in the Bialystok and Minsk “boilers”, 11 rifle, 2 cavalry, 6 tank and 4 motorized divisions were destroyed, 3 commanders and 2 commanders were killed, 2 commanders and 6 division commanders were captured, another 1 corps commander and 2 commanders divisions were missing.

04:10

The Western and Baltic Special Districts reported on the start of hostilities by German troops on land.

04:12

German bombers appeared over Sevastopol. The enemy raid was repulsed, and an attempt to strike at the ships was thwarted, but residential buildings and warehouses were damaged in the city.

From the memoirs of Sevastopol Anatoly Marsanov:“I was then only five years old ... The only thing that remains in my memory: on the night of June 22, parachutes appeared in the sky. It became light, I remember, the whole city was illuminated, everyone was running, so joyful ... They shouted: “Paratroopers! Paratroopers!”… They don't know that these are mines. And they both gasped - one in the bay, the other - down the street below us, they killed so many people!

04:15

The defense of the Brest Fortress began. By the first attack, by 04:55, the Germans occupied almost half of the fortress.

From the memoirs of the defender of the Brest Fortress Pyotr Kotelnikov, born in 1929:“In the morning we were awakened by a strong blow. Broke the roof. I was stunned. I saw the wounded and the dead, I realized: this is no longer an exercise, but a war. Most of the soldiers of our barracks died in the first seconds. Following the adults, I rushed to the weapon, but they did not give me rifles. Then I, with one of the Red Army soldiers, rushed to extinguish the clothing warehouse. Then he moved with the soldiers to the cellars of the barracks of the neighboring 333rd Infantry Regiment ... We helped the wounded, brought them ammunition, food, water. Through the western wing at night they made their way to the river to draw water, and returned back.

05:00

Moscow time, Reich Minister of Foreign Affairs Joachim von Ribbentrop summoned Soviet diplomats to his office. When they arrived, he informed them of the start of the war. The last thing he said to the ambassadors was: "Tell Moscow that I was against the attack." After that, telephones did not work in the embassy, ​​and the building itself was surrounded by SS detachments.

5:30

Schulenburg officially informed Molotov about the beginning of the war between Germany and the USSR, reading out a note: “Bolshevik Moscow is ready to stab in the back of National Socialist Germany, which is fighting for existence. The German government cannot be indifferent to the serious threat on the eastern border. Therefore, the Fuhrer gave the order to the German armed forces to ward off this threat with all their might and means ... "

From the memoirs of Molotov:"The adviser to the German ambassador Hilger, when he handed the note, shed a tear."

From Hilger's memoirs:“He gave vent to his indignation by declaring that Germany had attacked a country with which it had a non-aggression pact. This has no precedent in history. The reason given by the German side is an empty pretext ... Molotov concluded his angry speech with the words: “We did not give any grounds for this.”

07:15

Directive No. 2 was issued, ordering the troops of the USSR to destroy enemy forces in areas of violation of the border, destroy enemy aircraft, and also “bomb Koenigsberg and Memel” (modern Kaliningrad and Klaipeda). The USSR Air Force was allowed to go "to the depth of German territory up to 100-150 km." At the same time, the first counterattack of the Soviet troops took place near the Lithuanian town of Alytus.

09:00

At 7:00 Berlin time, Reich Minister of Public Education and Propaganda Joseph Goebbels read out on the radio Adolf Hitler's appeal to the German people in connection with the outbreak of war against the Soviet Union: “... Today I decided to once again put the fate and future of the German Reich and our people into the hands of our soldier. May the Lord help us in this struggle!

09:30

Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Mikhail Kalinin signed a number of decrees, including the decree on the introduction of martial law, on the formation of the Headquarters of the High Command, on military tribunals and on general mobilization, to which all those liable for military service from 1905 to 1918 were born.

10:00

German bombers raided Kyiv and its suburbs. The railway station, the Bolshevik plant, an aircraft plant, power plants, military airfields, and residential buildings were bombed. According to official data, 25 people died as a result of the bombing, according to unofficial data, there were many more victims. However, peaceful life continued in the capital of Ukraine for several more days. Only the opening of the stadium, scheduled for June 22, was canceled; on this day, the football match Dynamo (Kyiv) - CSKA was supposed to take place here.

12:15

Molotov made a speech on the radio about the beginning of the war, where he first called it patriotic. Also in this speech, for the first time, the phrase that became the main slogan of the war is heard: “Our cause is just. The enemy will be defeated. Victory will be ours".

From Molotov's address:“This unprecedented attack on our country is an unparalleled perfidy in the history of civilized peoples... This war was imposed on us not by the German people, not by the German workers, peasants and intelligentsia, whose suffering we understand well, but by a clique of bloodthirsty fascist rulers of Germany who enslaved the French, Czechs , Poles, Serbs, Norway, Belgium, Denmark, Holland, Greece and other peoples ... This is not the first time our people have to deal with an attacking arrogant enemy. At one time, our people responded to Napoleon's campaign in Russia with a Patriotic War, and Napoleon was defeated and came to his own collapse. The same will happen to the arrogant Hitler, who has announced a new campaign against our country. The Red Army and all our people will again wage a victorious patriotic war for the Motherland, for honor, for freedom.

The working people of Leningrad listen to the message about the attack of fascist Germany on the Soviet Union

From the memoirs of Dmitry Savelyev, Novokuznetsk: “We gathered at the poles with loudspeakers. We listened carefully to Molotov's speech. For many, there was a feeling of some kind of wariness. After that, the streets began to empty, after a while food disappeared from the stores. They weren’t bought up – just the supply was reduced… People weren’t scared, but rather focused, doing everything the government told them to do.”

After some time, the text of Molotov's speech was repeated by the famous announcer Yuri Levitan. Thanks to his soulful voice and the fact that Levitan read the front-line reports of the Soviet Information Bureau throughout the war, it is believed that he was the first to read the message about the beginning of the war on the radio. Even marshals Zhukov and Rokossovsky thought so, as they wrote about in their memoirs.

Moscow. Announcer Yuri Levitan during filming in the studio

From the memoirs of announcer Yuri Levitan:“When we, the announcers, were called to the radio early in the morning, the calls had already begun to ring out. They call from Minsk: “Enemy planes over the city”, they call from Kaunas: “The city is on fire, why are you not transmitting anything on the radio?”, “Enemy planes are over Kiev.” Women's crying, excitement - "is it really a war"? .. And now I remember - I turned on the microphone. In all cases, I remember myself that I only worried internally, only experienced internally. But here, when I uttered the word “Moscow is speaking”, I feel that I can’t continue to speak - a lump stuck in my throat. They are already knocking from the control room - “Why are you silent? Go on! He clenched his fists and continued: "Citizens and citizens of the Soviet Union ..."

Stalin delivered a speech to the Soviet people only on July 3, 12 days after the start of the war. Historians are still arguing why he was silent for so long. Here is how Vyacheslav Molotov explained this fact:“Why me and not Stalin? He didn't want to go first. It is necessary that there be a clearer picture, what tone and what approach ... He said that he would wait a few days and speak when the situation on the fronts cleared up.

And here is what Marshal Zhukov wrote about this:"AND. V. Stalin was a strong-willed man and, as they say, "not from a cowardly dozen." Confused, I saw him only once. It was at dawn on June 22, 1941, when Nazi Germany attacked our country. During the first day, he could not really pull himself together and firmly direct events. The shock produced on I. V. Stalin by the attack of the enemy was so strong that his voice even dropped, and his orders for organizing armed struggle did not always correspond to the situation.

From a speech by Stalin on the radio on July 3, 1941:“The war with fascist Germany cannot be considered an ordinary war ... Our war for the freedom of our Fatherland will merge with the struggle of the peoples of Europe and America for their independence, for democratic freedoms.”

12:30

At the same time, German troops entered Grodno. A few minutes later, the bombardment of Minsk, Kyiv, Sevastopol and other cities began again.

From the memoirs of Ninel Karpova, born in 1931 (Kharovsk Vologda region): “We listened to the message about the beginning of the war from the loudspeaker at the House of Defense. There were a lot of people there. I was not upset, on the contrary, I became proud: my father will defend the Motherland ... In general, people were not afraid. Yes, women, of course, were upset, crying. But there was no panic. Everyone was sure that we would quickly defeat the Germans. The men said: "Yes, the Germans will drape from us!"

Recruiting stations were opened in the military registration and enlistment offices. Queues lined up in Moscow, Leningrad and other cities.

From the memoirs of Dina Belykh, born in 1936 (Kushva, Sverdlovsk region):“All men immediately began to call, including my dad. Dad hugged mom, they both cried, kissed ... I remember how I grabbed him by the tarpaulin boots and shouted: “Daddy, don’t go! They'll kill you there, they'll kill you!" When he got on the train, my mother took me in her arms, we both sobbed, she whispered through tears: “Wave to dad ...” What is it, I sobbed so much, I could not move my hand. We never saw him again, our breadwinner."

Calculations and experience of the mobilization carried out showed that in order to transfer the army and navy to wartime, 4.9 million people were required to be called up. However, when mobilization was announced, 14 ages of conscripts were called up, the total number of which was about 10 million people, that is, almost 5.1 million people more than what was required.

The first day of mobilization in the Red Army. Volunteers in the Oktyabrsky military registration and enlistment office

The conscription of such a mass of people was not caused by military necessity and introduced disorganization into National economy and anxiety to the masses. Without realizing this, Marshal of the Soviet Union G. I. Kulik suggested that the government additionally call on older ages (1895 - 1904), the total number of which was 6.8 million people.

13:15

To capture the Brest Fortress, the Germans brought into action new forces of the 133rd Infantry Regiment on the Southern and Western Islands, but this "did not bring changes in the situation." The Brest Fortress continued to hold the line. Fritz Schlieper's 45th Infantry Division was thrown into this sector of the front. It was decided that only infantry would take the Brest Fortress - without tanks. No more than eight hours were allotted for the capture of the fortress.

From a report to the headquarters of the 45th Infantry Division Fritz Schlieper:“The Russians are fiercely resisting, especially behind our attacking companies. In the Citadel, the enemy organized defense with infantry units supported by 35-40 tanks and armored vehicles. The fire of Russian snipers led to heavy losses among officers and non-commissioned officers.

14:30

Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano told the Soviet ambassador in Rome, Gorelkin, that Italy had declared war on the USSR "from the moment German troops entered Soviet territory."

From Ciano's diaries:“He perceives my message with rather great indifference, but this is in his nature. The message is very short, without unnecessary words. The conversation lasted two minutes.

15:00

The pilots of the German bombers reported that they had nothing more to bomb, all airfields, barracks and concentrations of armored vehicles were destroyed.

From the memoirs of Air Marshal, Hero of the Soviet Union G.V. Zimina:“On June 22, 1941, large groups of fascist bombers attacked 66 of our airfields, on which the main aviation forces of the western border districts were based. First of all, airfields were subjected to air strikes, on which aviation regiments were based, armed with aircraft of new designs ... As a result of attacks on airfields and in fierce air battles, the enemy managed to destroy up to 1,200 aircraft, including 800 at airfields.

16:30

Stalin left the Kremlin for the Near Dacha. Until the end of the day, even members of the Politburo are not allowed to see the leader.

From the memoirs of Politburo member Nikita Khrushchev:
“Beria told the following: when the war began, members of the Politburo gathered at Stalin's. I don’t know, all or only a certain group, which most often met with Stalin. Stalin was morally completely depressed and made the following statement: “The war has begun, it is developing catastrophically. Lenin left us the proletarian Soviet state, and we pissed it off.” Literally said so.
“I,” he says, “refuse leadership,” and left. He left, got into the car and drove to a nearby dacha.

Some historians, referring to the memories of other participants in the events, argue that this conversation took place a day later. But the fact that in the first days of the war Stalin was confused and did not know how to act is confirmed by many witnesses.

18:30

The commander of the 4th Army, Ludwig Kubler, gives the order to "pull his own forces" at the Brest Fortress. This is one of the first orders for the retreat of German troops.

19:00

The commander of Army Group Center, General Fedor von Bock, gives the order to stop the execution of Soviet prisoners of war. After that, they were kept in hastily fenced fields with barbed wire. This is how the first camps for prisoners of war appeared.

From the notes of SS Brigadeführer G. Keppler, commander of the "Der Fuhrer" regiment from the SS division "Das Reich":“In the hands of our regiment were rich trophies and a large number of prisoners, among whom were many civilians, even women and girls, the Russians forced them to defend themselves with weapons in their hands, and they bravely fought along with the Red Army.”

23:00

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered a radio address in which he stated that England "will give Russia and the Russian people all the help it can."

Winston Churchill's speech on the air of the BBC radio station:“Over the past 25 years, no one has been a more consistent opponent of communism than me. I won't take back a single word I said about him. But all this pales before the spectacle now unfolding. The past with its crimes, follies and tragedies is disappearing... I see Russian soldiers standing on the threshold of their native land, guarding the fields that their fathers have cultivated since time immemorial... I see how the vile Nazi war machine is approaching all this.

23:50

The Main Military Council of the Red Army sent out Directive No. 3, ordering June 23 to launch counterattacks against enemy groups.

Text: Information Center of the Kommersant Publishing House, Tatiana Mishanina, Artem Galustyan
Video: Dmitry Shelkovnikov, Alexey Koshel
A photo: TASS, RIA Novosti, Ogonyok, Dmitry Kuchev
Design, programming and layout: Anton Zhukov, Alexey Shabrov
Kim Voronin
Commissioning Editor: Artem Galustyan

In Sevastopol, the war came earlier than in other cities of the Soviet Union - the first bombs were dropped on the city at 3:15 in the morning. Before the officially approved time of the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. It was at 03:15 that the commander of the Black Sea Fleet, Vice Admiral Filipp Oktyabrsky, called the capital and reported to Admiral Kuznetsov that an air raid had been carried out on Sevastopol and anti-aircraft artillery was returning fire.

The Germans sought to block the fleet. They dropped bottom non-contact mines of enormous power. The bombs were dropped by parachutes, when the projectile reached the surface of the water, the mounts came off, and the bomb went to the bottom. These mines had specific targets - Soviet ships. But one of them fell on a residential area - about 20 people died, more than 100 were injured.

Warships and anti-aircraft defenses were ready to strike back. As early as 03:06, the Chief of Staff of the Black Sea Fleet, Rear Admiral Ivan Eliseev, gave the order to open fire on fascist aircraft that had invaded far into the airspace of the USSR. This is how he left a mark in a series of historical events - he gave the first combat order to repel enemy attacks.

It's interesting that long time Eliseev's feat was either hushed up or adjusted to fit into the official chronology of hostilities. That is why in some sources you can find information that the order was given at 4 o'clock in the morning. In those days, this order was given contrary to the orders of the higher military command and, according to the laws, he should have been shot.

June 22 at 3:48 in Sevastopol already had the first victims of the Great Patriotic War. 12 minutes before the official announcement of the start of hostilities, German bombs ended the lives of civilians. In Sevastopol, a monument to the first victims of the war was built in memory of them.

June 21, 1941, 13:00. German troops receive the code signal "Dortmund", confirming that the invasion will begin the next day.

Commander of the 2nd Panzer Group, Army Group Center Heinz Guderian writes in his diary: “Careful observation of the Russians convinced me that they did not suspect anything about our intentions. In the courtyard of the fortress of Brest, which was visible from our observation posts, to the sounds of an orchestra, they were holding guards. Coastal fortifications along the Western Bug were not occupied by Russian troops.

21:00. Soldiers of the 90th border detachment of the Sokal commandant's office detained a German soldier who had crossed the border river Bug by swimming. The defector was sent to the headquarters of the detachment in the city of Vladimir-Volynsky.

23:00. German minelayers, who were in Finnish ports, began to mine the way out of the Gulf of Finland. At the same time, Finnish submarines began laying mines off the coast of Estonia.

June 22, 1941, 0:30. The defector was taken to Vladimir-Volynsky. During interrogation, the soldier named himself Alfred Liskov, servicemen of the 221st regiment of the 15th infantry division of the Wehrmacht. He reported that at dawn on June 22 the German army would go on the offensive along the entire length of the Soviet-German border. The information has been passed on to the higher command.

At the same time, the transfer of directive No. 1 of the People's Commissariat of Defense for parts of the western military districts begins from Moscow. “During June 22-23, 1941, a sudden attack by the Germans on the fronts of the LVO, PribOVO, ZAPOVO, KOVO, OdVO is possible. The attack may begin with provocative actions,” the directive said. “The task of our troops is not to succumb to any provocative actions that could cause major complications.”

The units were ordered to be put on alert, covertly occupy the firing points of fortified areas on the state border, and aviation was dispersed over field airfields.

bring the directive to military units before the start of hostilities fails, as a result of which the measures indicated in it are not carried out.

Mobilization. Columns of fighters are moving to the front. Photo: RIA Novosti

“I realized that it was the Germans who opened fire on our territory”

1:00. The commandants of the sections of the 90th border detachment report to the head of the detachment, Major Bychkovsky: "nothing suspicious was noticed on the adjacent side, everything is calm."

3:05 . A group of 14 German Ju-88 bombers drops 28 magnetic mines near the Kronstadt raid.

3:07. The commander of the Black Sea Fleet, Vice Admiral Oktyabrsky, reports to the Chief of the General Staff, General Zhukov: “The VNOS [airborne surveillance, warning and communications] system of the fleet reports on the approach from the sea of ​​a large number of unknown aircraft; The fleet is on full alert.

3:10. The UNKGB in the Lvov region transmits by telephone to the NKGB of the Ukrainian SSR the information obtained during the interrogation of the defector Alfred Liskov.

From the memoirs of the head of the 90th border detachment, Major Bychkovsky: “Not having finished interrogating the soldier, I heard strong artillery fire in the direction of Ustilug (the first commandant's office). I realized that it was the Germans who opened fire on our territory, which was immediately confirmed by the interrogated soldier. I immediately began to call the commandant by phone, but the connection was broken ... "

3:30. Chief of Staff of the Western District General Klimovsky reports on enemy air raids on the cities of Belarus: Brest, Grodno, Lida, Kobrin, Slonim, Baranovichi and others.

3:33. The chief of staff of the Kiev district, General Purkaev, reports on air raids on the cities of Ukraine, including Kyiv.

3:40. Commander of the Baltic Military District General Kuznetsov reports on enemy air raids on Riga, Siauliai, Vilnius, Kaunas and other cities.

"Enemy raid repulsed. An attempt to strike our ships has been thwarted."

3:42. Chief of the General Staff Zhukov calls Stalin and announces the start of hostilities by Germany. Stalin orders Tymoshenko and Zhukov to arrive at the Kremlin, where an emergency meeting of the Politburo is being convened.

3:45. The 1st frontier post of the 86th Augustow border detachment was attacked by an enemy reconnaissance and sabotage group. Outpost personnel under command Alexandra Sivacheva, having joined the battle, destroys the attackers.

4:00. The commander of the Black Sea Fleet, Vice Admiral Oktyabrsky, reports to Zhukov: “The enemy raid has been repulsed. An attempt to strike our ships has been thwarted. But there is destruction in Sevastopol.”

4:05. The outposts of the 86th August Frontier Detachment, including the 1st Frontier Post of Senior Lieutenant Sivachev, are subjected to heavy artillery fire, after which the German offensive begins. The border guards, deprived of communication with the command, engage in battle with superior enemy forces.

4:10. The Western and Baltic Special Military Districts report the start of hostilities by German troops on land.

4:15. The Nazis open massive artillery fire on the Brest Fortress. As a result, warehouses were destroyed, communications were disrupted, and there were a large number of dead and wounded.

4:25. The 45th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht begins an attack on the Brest Fortress.

The Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. Residents of the capital on June 22, 1941 during the announcement on the radio of a government message about the perfidious attack of Nazi Germany on the Soviet Union. Photo: RIA Novosti

"Defending not individual countries, but ensuring the security of Europe"

4:30. A meeting of members of the Politburo begins in the Kremlin. Stalin expresses doubt that what happened is the beginning of the war and does not exclude the version of a German provocation. People's Commissar of Defense Timoshenko and Zhukov insist: this is war.

4:55. In the Brest Fortress, the Nazis manage to capture almost half of the territory. Further progress was stopped by a sudden counterattack by the Red Army.

5:00. German Ambassador to the USSR Count von Schulenburg presents the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR Molotov“Note from the German Foreign Ministry to the Soviet Government”, which states: “The German government cannot be indifferent to a serious threat on the eastern border, therefore the Führer ordered the German armed forces to ward off this threat by all means.” An hour after the actual start of hostilities, Germany de jure declares war on the Soviet Union.

5:30. On German radio, the Reich Minister of Propaganda Goebbels read out an appeal Adolf Hitler to the German people in connection with the outbreak of war against the Soviet Union: “Now the hour has come when it is necessary to oppose this conspiracy of Jewish-Anglo-Saxon warmongers and also Jewish rulers of the Bolshevik center in Moscow ... In this moment the greatest in terms of its length and volume of the performance of troops, which the world has ever seen ... The task of this front is no longer the defense of individual countries, but the security of Europe and thereby the salvation of all.

7:00. Reich Minister for Foreign Ribbentrop begins a press conference at which he announces the start of hostilities against the USSR: "The German army invaded the territory of Bolshevik Russia!"

“The city is on fire, why aren’t you broadcasting anything on the radio?”

7:15. Stalin approves the directive to repel the attack Nazi Germany: "The troops should use all their strength and means to attack the enemy forces and destroy them in areas where they violated the Soviet border." The transfer of "Directive No. 2" due to the violation by saboteurs of the communication lines in the western districts. Moscow does not have a clear picture of what is happening in the war zone.

9:30. It was decided that at noon Molotov, People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, would address the Soviet people in connection with the outbreak of war.

10:00. From the memories of the announcer Yuri Levitan: “They call from Minsk: “Enemy planes are over the city”, they call from Kaunas: “The city is on fire, why are you not transmitting anything on the radio?”, “Enemy planes are over Kiev.” Women's crying, excitement: “Is it really a war? ..” However, no official messages are transmitted until 12:00 Moscow time on June 22.

10:30. From the report of the headquarters of the 45th German division on the battles on the territory of the Brest Fortress: “The Russians are fiercely resisting, especially behind our attacking companies. In the citadel, the enemy organized defense by infantry units supported by 35-40 tanks and armored vehicles. The fire of enemy snipers led to heavy losses among officers and non-commissioned officers.

11:00. The Baltic, Western and Kyiv special military districts were transformed into the Northwestern, Western and Southwestern fronts.

“The enemy will be defeated. Victory will be ours"

12:00. People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Vyacheslav Molotov read out an appeal to the citizens of the Soviet Union: "Today at 4 o'clock in the morning, without presenting any claims against the Soviet Union, without declaring war, German troops attacked our country, attacked our borders in many places and bombed from our cities - Zhytomyr, Kyiv, Sevastopol, Kaunas and some others - more than two hundred people were killed and wounded. Enemy aircraft raids and artillery shelling were also carried out from Romanian and Finnish territory ... Now that the attack on the Soviet Union has already taken place, the Soviet government has given an order to our troops to repel the piratical attack and drive the German troops from the territory of our homeland ... The government calls on you, citizens and citizens of the Soviet Union, to rally their ranks still more closely around our glorious Bolshevik Party, around our Soviet government, around our great leader Comrade Stalin.

Our cause is right. The enemy will be defeated. Victory will be ours" .

12:30. Advanced German units break into the Belarusian city of Grodno.

13:00. The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issues a decree "On the mobilization of those liable for military service ..."
“On the basis of Article 49 of paragraph “o” of the Constitution of the USSR, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR announces mobilization on the territory of the military districts - Leningrad, Special Baltic, Western Special, Kiev Special, Odessa, Kharkov, Oryol, Moscow, Arkhangelsk, Ural, Siberian, Volga, North - Caucasian and Transcaucasian.

Those liable for military service who were born from 1905 to 1918 inclusive are subject to mobilization. Consider June 23, 1941 as the first day of mobilization. Despite the fact that June 23 is named the first day of mobilization, recruiting offices at the military registration and enlistment offices begin to work by the middle of the day on June 22.

13:30. The Chief of the General Staff, General Zhukov, flies to Kyiv as a representative of the newly created Headquarters of the High Command on the Southwestern Front.

Photo: RIA Novosti

14:00. The Brest Fortress is completely surrounded by German troops. Soviet units blockaded in the citadel continue to offer fierce resistance.

14:05. Foreign Minister of Italy Galeazzo Ciano declares: “In view of the current situation, due to the fact that Germany has declared war on the USSR, Italy, as an ally of Germany and as a member of the Tripartite Pact, also declares war on the Soviet Union from the moment the German troops enter Soviet territory.”

14:10. The 1st frontier post of Alexander Sivachev has been fighting for more than 10 hours. The border guards, who had only small arms and grenades, destroyed up to 60 Nazis and burned three tanks. The wounded head of the outpost continued to command the battle.

15:00. From the notes of Field Marshal Commander of Army Group Center bokeh background: “The question of whether the Russians are carrying out a planned withdrawal is still open. There is now ample evidence both for and against this.

It is surprising that nowhere is any significant work of their artillery visible. Strong artillery fire is conducted only in the north-west of Grodno, where the VIII Army Corps is advancing. Apparently, our air force has an overwhelming superiority over Russian aviation.

Of the 485 frontier posts attacked, none retreated without an order.

16:00. After a 12-hour battle, the Nazis occupy the positions of the 1st frontier post. This became possible only after all the border guards who defended it died. The head of the outpost, Alexander Sivachev, was posthumously awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st class.

The feat of the outpost of Senior Lieutenant Sivachev became one of the hundreds accomplished by the border guards in the first hours and days of the war. The state border of the USSR from the Barents to the Black Sea on June 22, 1941 was guarded by 666 border outposts, 485 of them were attacked on the very first day of the war. None of the 485 outposts attacked on June 22 withdrew without orders.

The Nazi command took 20 minutes to break the resistance of the border guards. 257 Soviet frontier posts held the defense from several hours to one day. More than one day - 20, more than two days - 16, more than three days - 20, more than four and five days - 43, from seven to nine days - 4, more than eleven days - 51, more than twelve days - 55, more than 15 days - 51 outposts. Up to two months, 45 outposts fought.

The Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. The working people of Leningrad listen to the message about the attack of fascist Germany on the Soviet Union. Photo: RIA Novosti

Of the 19,600 border guards who met the Nazis on June 22 in the direction of the main attack of Army Group Center, more than 16,000 died in the first days of the war.

17:00. Hitler's units manage to occupy the southwestern part of the Brest Fortress, the northeast remained under the control of Soviet troops. Stubborn battles for the fortress will continue for another week.

"The Church of Christ blesses all Orthodox for the defense of the sacred borders of our Motherland"

18:00. The Patriarchal Locum Tenens, Metropolitan Sergius of Moscow and Kolomna, addresses the faithful with a message: “Fascist robbers have attacked our homeland. Trampling all sorts of treaties and promises, they suddenly fell upon us, and now the blood of peaceful citizens is already irrigating our native land ... Our Orthodox Church has always shared the fate of the people. Together with him, she carried trials, and consoled herself with his successes. She will not leave her people even now… The Church of Christ blesses all Orthodox to defend the sacred borders of our Motherland.”

19:00. From the notes of the Chief of the General Staff of the Wehrmacht Ground Forces, Colonel General Franz Halder: “All the armies, except for the 11th Army of the Army Group South in Romania, went on the offensive according to the plan. The offensive of our troops, apparently, was a complete tactical surprise for the enemy on the entire front. The border bridges across the Bug and other rivers have been everywhere captured by our troops without a fight and in complete safety. The complete surprise of our offensive for the enemy is evidenced by the fact that the units were taken by surprise in the barracks, the planes stood at the airfields, covered with tarpaulins, and the advanced units, suddenly attacked by our troops, asked the command what to do ... The Air Force command reported, that today 850 enemy aircraft have been destroyed, including entire squadrons of bombers, which, having taken to the air without fighter cover, were attacked by our fighters and destroyed.

20:00. Directive No. 3 of the People's Commissariat of Defense was approved, ordering the Soviet troops to go on the counteroffensive with the task of defeating the Nazi troops on the territory of the USSR with further advance into the territory of the enemy. The directive prescribed by the end of June 24 to capture the Polish city of Lublin.

Great Patriotic War 1941-1945. June 22, 1941 Nurses assist the first wounded after the Nazi air raid near Chisinau. Photo: RIA Novosti

"We must give Russia and the Russian people all the help we can"

21:00. Summary of the High Command of the Red Army for June 22: “At dawn on June 22, 1941, the regular troops of the German army attacked our border units on the front from the Baltic to the Black Sea and were held back by them during the first half of the day. In the afternoon, the German troops met with the advanced units of the field troops of the Red Army. After fierce fighting, the enemy was repulsed with heavy losses. Only in the Grodno and Krystynopol directions did the enemy manage to achieve minor tactical successes and occupy the towns of Kalvaria, Stoyanuv and Tsekhanovets (the first two at 15 km and the last at 10 km from the border).

Enemy aviation attacked a number of our airfields and settlements, but everywhere they met with a decisive rebuff from our fighters and anti-aircraft artillery, which inflicted heavy losses on the enemy. We shot down 65 enemy planes."

23:00. Message from the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to the British people in connection with the German attack on the USSR: “At 4 o’clock this morning, Hitler attacked Russia. All his usual formalities of treachery were observed with scrupulous precision ... suddenly, without a declaration of war, even without an ultimatum, German bombs fell from the sky on Russian cities, German troops violated Russian borders, and an hour later the German ambassador, who just the day before generously lavished his assurances to the Russians in friendship and almost an alliance, paid a visit to the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs and declared that Russia and Germany were in a state of war ...

No one has been a more staunch opponent of communism over the past 25 years than I have been. I will not take back a single word said about him. But all this pales before the spectacle unfolding now.

The past, with its crimes, follies and tragedies, recedes. I see Russian soldiers standing on the border of their native land and guarding the fields that their fathers have plowed since time immemorial. I see how they guard their homes; their mothers and wives pray—oh, yes, because at such a time everyone prays for the preservation of their loved ones, for the return of the breadwinner, patron, their protectors ...

We must give Russia and the Russian people all the help we can. We must call on all our friends and allies in all parts of the world to follow a similar course and pursue it as steadfastly and steadily as we will, to the very end.

June 22 has come to an end. Ahead were another 1417 days of the most terrible war in the history of mankind.

In the terrible and bloody confusion of the first day of the Great Patriotic War, the exploits of those soldiers and commanders of the Red Army, border guards, sailors and pilots, who, not sparing their own lives, repelled the onslaught of the strong and skillful against, stand out clearly.

War or provocation?

On June 22, 1941, at 5:45 am, an urgent meeting began in the Kremlin with the participation of the country's top military and political leadership. There was only one item on the agenda. Is this a full-scale war or a border provocation?

Pale and sleepy, Joseph Stalin sat at the table, holding a pipe not stuffed with tobacco in his hands. Addressing the People's Commissar for Defense, Marshal Semyon Timoshenko and the Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army, General Georgy Zhukov, the de facto ruler of the USSR asked: "Is this not a provocation of the German generals?"

“No, Comrade Stalin, the Germans are bombing our cities in the Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltic states. What kind of provocation is this? Timoshenko answered gloomily.

Offensive in three main directions

By this time, fierce border battles were already in full swing on the Soviet-German border. Events developed rapidly.

Field Marshal Wilhelm von Leeb's Army Group North was advancing in the Baltic, breaking the battle formations of the North-Western Front of General Fyodor Kuznetsov. At the forefront of the main attack was General Erich von Manstein's 56th motorized corps.

Army Group "South" of Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt operated in Ukraine, inflicting a blow between the Fifth and Sixth Armies of the Southwestern Front of General Mikhail Kirponos by the forces of the First Panzer Group of General Ewald von Kleist and the Sixth Field Army of Field Marshal Walther von Reichenau, advancing by the end of the day by 20 kilometers.

The Wehrmacht, which numbered in its ranks seven million 200 thousand people against five million 400 thousand soldiers and commanders in the Red Army, dealt the main blow in the zone of the Western Front, which was under the command of General Dmitry Pavlov. The strike was carried out by the troops of Field Marshal Fedor von Bock's Army Group Center, which included two tank groups at once - the Second General Heinz Guderian and the Third General Hermann Goth.

sad picture of the day

Hanging from the south and from the north over the Belostok ledge, in which the 10th army of General Konstantin Golubev was located, both German tank armies moved under the base of the ledge, destroying the defenses of the Soviet front. By seven o'clock in the morning, Brest, which was part of Guderian's offensive zone, was captured, but the units defending the Brest fortress and the station fought fiercely in complete encirclement.

The actions of the ground troops were actively supported by the Luftwaffe, which destroyed on June 22 1200 aircraft of the Red Army aviation, many still at airfields in the first hours of the war, and gained air supremacy.

A sad picture of the day was described in his memoirs by General Ivan Boldin, whom Pavlov sent by plane from Minsk to restore contact with the command of the 10th Army.

During the first 8 hours of the war, the Soviet army lost 1200 aircraft, of which about 900 were destroyed on the ground. In the photo: June 23, 1941 in Kyiv, Grushki district.

Nazi Germany relied on a blitzkrieg strategy. Her plan, called "Barbarossa", meant the end of the war before the autumn thaw. In the photo: German aircraft bombing Soviet cities. June 22, 1941.

The day after the start of the war, in accordance with the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the mobilization of 14 ages (born 1905-1918) in 14 military districts was announced. In the other three districts - Trans-Baikal, Central Asian and Far Eastern - mobilization was carried out a month later under the guise of "large training camps." In the photo: recruits in Moscow, June 23, 1941.

Simultaneously with Germany, Italy and Romania declared war on the USSR. A day later, Slovakia joined them. In the photo: a tank regiment at the Military Academy of Mechanization and Motorization named after. Stalin before being sent to the front. Moscow, June 1941.

On June 23, the Headquarters of the High Command of the Armed Forces of the USSR was created. In August, it was renamed the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command. In the photo: columns of fighters go to the front. Moscow, June 23, 1941.

As of June 22, 1941, the USSR state border from the Barents to the Black Sea was guarded by 666 border outposts, 485 of them were attacked on the very first day of the war. None of the outposts attacked on June 22 retreated without orders. In the photo: children on the streets of the city. Moscow, June 23, 1941.

Of the 19,600 border guards who met the Nazis on June 22, more than 16,000 died in the first days of the war. In the photo: refugees. June 23, 1941

At the beginning of the war, three groups of German armies were concentrated and deployed near the borders of the USSR: "North", "Center" and "South". They were supported from the air by three air fleets. In the photo: collective farmers are building defensive lines in the front line. July 1, 1941.

Army "North" was supposed to destroy the forces of the USSR in the Baltic states, as well as capture Leningrad and Kronstadt, depriving the Russian fleet of its strongholds in the Baltic. "Center" provided an offensive in Belarus and the capture of Smolensk. Army Group South was responsible for the offensive in western Ukraine. In the photo: the family leaves their home in Kirovograd. August 1, 1941.

In addition, on the territory of occupied Norway and in Northern Finland, the Wehrmacht had a separate army "Norway", which was set to capture Murmansk, the main naval base of the Northern Fleet, Polyarny, the Rybachy Peninsula, and also Kirovskaya railway north of Belomorsk. In the photo: columns of fighters are moving to the front. Moscow, June 23, 1941.

Finland did not allow Germany to strike at the USSR from its territory, but received instructions from the German Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces to prepare for the start of the operation. Without waiting for the attack, on the morning of June 25, the Soviet command launched a massive air strike on 18 Finnish airfields. After that, Finland announced that it was at war with the USSR. In the photo: graduates of the Military Academy. Stalin. Moscow, June 1941.

On June 27, Hungary also declared war on the USSR. On July 1, at the direction of Germany, the Hungarian Carpathian Group of Forces attacked the Soviet 12th Army. In the photo: nurses help the first wounded after the Nazi air raid near Chisinau, June 22, 1941.

From July 1 to September 30, 1941, the Red Army and the Soviet Navy carried out the Leningrad strategic operation. According to the Barbarossa plan, the capture of Leningrad and Kronstadt was one of the intermediate goals, followed by an operation to capture Moscow. In the photo: a link of Soviet fighters flies over the Peter and Paul Fortress in Leningrad. August 01, 1941.

One of the largest operations in the first months of the war was the defense of Odessa. The bombing of the city began on July 22, and in August Odessa was surrounded by German-Romanian troops from land. In the photo: one of the first German aircraft shot down near Odessa. July 1, 1941.

The defense of Odessa delayed the advance of the right wing of Army Group South for 73 days. During this time, the German-Romanian troops lost over 160 thousand troops, about 200 aircraft and up to 100 tanks. In the photo: scout Katya from Odessa is talking with the fighters, sitting in a wagon. District Red Dalnik. August 01, 1941.

The original plan of "Barbarossa" assumed the capture of Moscow during the first three to four months of the war. However, despite the successes of the Wehrmacht, the increased resistance of the Soviet troops prevented its implementation. They delayed the German offensive of the battle for Smolensk, Kyiv and Leningrad. In the photo: anti-aircraft gunners defend the sky of the capital. August 1, 1941.

The battle for Moscow, which the Germans called Operation Typhoon, began on September 30, 1941, the offensive was carried out by the main forces of Army Group Center. In the photo: flowers to wounded soldiers in a Moscow hospital. June 30, 1941.

The defensive stage of the Moscow operation was carried out until December 1941. And only at the beginning of the 42nd year, the Red Army went on the offensive, pushing the German troops back 100-250 kilometers back. In the photo: the beams of searchlights of the air defense forces illuminate the sky of Moscow. June 1941.

At noon on June 22, 1941, the whole country listened to the radio address of the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR Vyacheslav Molotov, who announced the German attack. “Our cause is right. The enemy will be defeated. Victory will be ours,” was the final phrase of the appeal to the Soviet people.

"Explosions shake the ground, cars burn"

“Trains and warehouses are on fire. Ahead, to our left, there are big fires on the horizon. Enemy bombers constantly scurry in the air.

Going around the settlements, we are approaching Bialystok. Further we go, worse it becomes. More and more enemy aircraft are in the air ... We had no time to move 200 meters from the plane after landing, when the noise of engines was heard in the sky. Nine Junkers showed up, they are descending over the airfield and dropping bombs. Explosions shake the ground, cars burn. The planes on which we had just arrived were also engulfed in fire ... "Our pilots fought to the last opportunity. In the early morning of June 22, the deputy squadron commander of the 46th Fighter Aviation Regiment, Senior Lieutenant Ivanov Ivanov, at the head of the I-16 troika, took on several He-111 bombers. One of them was shot down, and the rest began to drop bombs and turn back.

At that moment, three more enemy vehicles appeared. Considering that the fuel was running out and the cartridges ran out, Ivanov decided to ram the leading German aircraft and, going into its tail and making a slide, sharply hit the enemy's tail with his propeller.

Soviet fighter I-16

The exact time of the air ram

A bomber with crosses crashed five kilometers from the airfield, which was defended by Soviet pilots, but Ivanov was also mortally wounded when an I-16 crashed on the outskirts of the village of Zagortsy. The exact time of the ramming - 4:25 - was recorded by the pilot's wristwatch, which stopped from hitting the dashboard. Ivanov died on the same day in a hospital in the city of Dubno. He was only 31 years old. In August 1941, he was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

At 5:10 am, Junior Lieutenant Dmitry Kokarev from the 124th Fighter Aviation Regiment took off his MiG-3. From left and right, his comrades took off - to intercept German bombers that attacked their field airfield in Vysoka Mazowiecke near Bialystok.

Shoot down the enemy at any cost

During a short-lived battle on the plane of 22-year-old Kokarev, the weapon failed, and the pilot decided to ram the enemy. Despite the aimed shots of the enemy shooter, the brave pilot approached the enemy Dornier Do 217 and shot it down, landing on the airfield on the damaged plane himself.

Pilot Oberfeldwebel Erich Stockmann and non-commissioned officer gunner Hans Schumacher burned to death in a wrecked aircraft. Only the navigator, squadron commander Lieutenant Hans-Georg Peters and flight radio operator Sergeant Hans Kownacki managed to survive after the swift attack of the Soviet fighter, who managed to jump out with parachutes.

In total, on the first day of the war, at least 15 Soviet pilots made an aerial ramming against the pilots of the Luftwaffe.

Fighting surrounded for days and weeks

On the ground, the Germans also began to suffer losses from the beginning of the invasion. First of all - faced with fierce resistance from the personnel of 485 attacked border outposts. According to the Barbarossa plan, no more than half an hour was allotted for the capture of each. In fact, the soldiers in green caps fought for hours, days and even weeks, nowhere retreating without an order.

The neighbors also distinguished themselves - the Third Frontier Outpost of the same detachment. Thirty-six border guards, led by 24-year-old lieutenant Viktor Usov, fought for more than six hours against the Wehrmacht infantry battalion, repeatedly switching to bayonet counterattacks. Having received five wounds, Usov died in a trench with a sniper rifle in his hands and in 1965 was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.

The Gold Star was also posthumously awarded to 26-year-old Lieutenant Aleksey Lopatin, commander of the 13th border outpost of the 90th Vladimir-Volynsky border detachment. Leading a circular defense, he fought with his subordinates for 11 days in complete encirclement, skillfully using the facilities of the local fortified area and favorable terrain. On June 29, he managed to withdraw women and children from the encirclement, and then, returning to the outpost, he, like his fighters, died in an unequal battle on July 2, 1941.

Landing on the enemy coast

The soldiers of the Ninth Frontier Post of the 17th Brest Frontier Detachment, Lieutenant Andrey Kizhevatov, were among the most staunch defenders of the Brest Fortress, which was stormed by the 45th Wehrmacht Infantry Division for nine days. The thirty-three-year-old commander was wounded on the first day of the war, but until June 29 he continued to lead the defense of the barracks of the 333rd regiment and the Terespol gates and died in a desperate counterattack. 20 years after the war, Kizhevatov was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

On the site of the 79th Izmail border detachment, which guarded the border with Romania, on June 22, 1941, 15 enemy attempts were repelled to cross the Prut and Danube rivers in order to capture a bridgehead on Soviet territory. At the same time, the well-aimed fire of the fighters in green caps was supplemented by aimed volleys of army artillery of the 51st Infantry Division of General Pyotr Tsirulnikov.

On June 24, the division’s soldiers, together with border guards and sailors of the Danube military flotilla, led by lieutenant commander Ivan Kubyshkin, crossed the Danube and captured a 70-kilometer bridgehead in Romania, which they held until July 19, when, by order of the command, the last paratroopers left for the eastern bank of the river .

Commandant of the first liberated city

The first city to be recognized as liberated from German troops was Przemysl (or Przemysl - in Polish) in Western Ukraine, which was attacked by the 101st Infantry Division from the 17th Field Army of General Karl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel, advancing on Lvov and Tarnopol.

Fierce battles ensued for him. On June 22, Przemysl was defended for 10 hours by the fighters of the Przemysl border detachment, who then retreated, having received the appropriate order. Their stubborn defense allowed them to gain time before the approach of the regiments of the 99th Infantry Division of Colonel Nikolai Dementyev, who the next morning, together with border guards and soldiers of the local fortified area, attacked the Germans, knocking them out of the city and holding it until June 27.

The hero of the battles was the 33-year-old senior lieutenant Grigory Polivoda, who commanded a combined battalion of border guards and became the first commander whose subordinates cleared the Soviet city of the enemy. He was rightfully appointed commandant of Przemysl and died in battle on July 30, 1941.

Gained time and pulled up new reserves

Following the results of the first day of the war with Russia, the chief of the general staff of the Wehrmacht Ground Forces, General Franz Halder, noted with some surprise in his personal diary that after the initial stupor caused by the suddenness of the attack, the Red Army switched to active operations. “Without a doubt, on the side of the enemy there were cases of tactical withdrawal, albeit disorderly. There are no signs of an operational withdrawal, ”the German general wrote.

Red Army soldiers go on the attack

He did not suspect that the war that had just begun and victorious for the Wehrmacht would soon turn from a lightning-fast one into a life-and-death struggle between the two states, and victory would not go to Germany at all.

General Kurt von Tippelskirch, who became a historian after the war, described the actions of the fighters and commanders of the Red Army in his works. “The Russians held out with unexpected firmness and tenacity, even when they were bypassed and surrounded. By doing this, they bought time and pulled together all the new reserves for counterattacks from the depths of the country, which, moreover, were stronger than expected.