After Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, the USSR demonstratively broke off all economic and military relations with Germany. From now on official rate The USSR is taking a course towards creating a “Collective Security” system in Europe.
In March 1938, Germany carried out the Anschluss of Austria, and on March 15, 1939, Germany occupied the Czech Republic. The threat of occupation of Poland loomed.
On March 18, 1939, the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR M. M. Litvinov proposed convening a conference of six countries: the USSR, England, France, Romania, Poland and Turkey in order to prevent further German aggression. However, the British side found this proposal “premature”.
April 16, 1939 Litvinov, in response to English sentence to give Poland unilateral guarantees also from the USSR, proposed a draft tripartite agreement providing for “to provide all kinds of assistance, including military, to the Eastern European states located between the Baltic and Black Seas and bordering the USSR, in the event of aggression against these states.”
The proposal for a tripartite alliance was perceived in the West as too radical.
Accordingly, the proposals of England and France to the Soviet Union were rejected as not meeting the principle of reciprocity.
Thus, the opportunity to create an anti-Hitler coalition was missed.
The prospect of participating in the war against Germany did not suit Stalin, and establishing contacts with Berlin became a priority for him. On May 3, Litvinov was dismissed and replaced by Molotov. In Berlin this was perceived as an encouraging sign (after all, Litvinov was a Jew, and it was not acceptable for the Nazi government to negotiate with a Jewish People's Commissar). A day later, German newspapers were banned from all attacks on the USSR.
In May 1939, negotiations with England and France were resumed. There was only one discrepancy - “indirect aggression”.
The Soviet formulation was regarded by England and France as a demand from the USSR to provide it with the opportunity to send its troops into neighboring countries at will and under any pretext.
According to Churchill, Poland, Romania, Finland and three Baltic states they didn’t know what they were more afraid of - German aggression or Russian salvation. It was the need to make such a terrible choice that paralyzed the politics of England and France.
On August 3, 1939, Ribbentrop made his first official statement on the topic of German-Soviet rapprochement, which, in particular, contained a hint about the division of spheres of influence.
Despite ongoing negotiations with England and France, Germany’s proposal to conclude a German-Soviet non-aggression treaty and division of spheres of influence seemed more profitable to Stalin.
On August 23, 1939, a non-aggression treaty between Germany and the Soviet Union with a secret protocol attached was signed.
And on September 1, Hitler attacked Poland. Poland's situation was hopeless. The Poles did not want to be occupied by the Red Army, but they also could not resist the Germans. England, although it entered into an alliance with Poland, provided it with military assistance I didn't.
On September 17, when almost all of Poland was occupied by German troops and the Polish government emigrated, the Red Army crossed the Polish border of Poland and in a few days, almost without any resistance, occupied territories previously belonging to Ukraine and Belarus. Thus, the lands that Poland annexed (except for Lithuania for now) as a result Soviet-Polish war according to the Riga Peace Treaty of 1921, they now became part of the USSR.
The Sovietization of these lands began.
Some actions new government aroused the approval of the population: expansion of the network of Ukrainian schools, improvement of living conditions and medical care, nationalization, which at first did not affect the interests of the Ukrainian population, because trade and large industry were in the hands of the Poles.
But soon the population felt the negative consequences of the activities of the new government: forced collectivization, liquidation of activities political parties, public organizations, terror against opponents of Soviet power.
But the Polish authorities in the period from 1921 to 1939 pursued a policy of polonization, the forced imposition of Catholicism and the oppression of Ukrainians and Belarusians.
On September 17, 1939, the Red Army entered Polish territory. This year marks exactly seventy years since these epoch-making events. But the political situation now is such that the events of those years are receiving increased attention political elites both Ukraine and modern Poland. Surely we should wait for the next loud statements about the treacherous attack, about the horrors Soviet occupation, about the atrocities of Red Army soldiers and hypocritical sighs about the fate of “unfortunate” Poland. At the same time, all participants in the future political-historical farce will forget about how Poland participated in the “deriban” of Czechoslovakia in 1938, what policy it pursued towards the Ukrainian and Belarusian population on its territory, and, of course, that thanks to “occupation” Ukraine established itself within its modern borders. Today we will try to remember what actually happened then. In this article I will focus exclusively on the military-political aspect of those events. We will talk about the social consequences of the “occupation” later.
Today, many pseudo-historians say that the Ribentrop-Molotov Pact contains clauses that obliged the USSR to attack Poland simultaneously with Germany, a week after the German attack, two weeks later, etc. The real story such statements don’t even smell. It’s just that the modern political situation requires us to put a bold equal sign between Nazi Germany and the USSR. In reality, the USSR not only did not undertake any obligations regarding the invasion of Poland, but also delayed this moment in every possible way.
Already on September 3, 1939, Ribbentrop sent the German Ambassador to the USSR F.V. Schulenburg was instructed to ask Molotov “whether the Soviet Union would consider it desirable for the Russian army to move at the appropriate moment against the Polish forces in the Russian sphere of influence and, for its part, to occupy this territory.” Similar requests from Germany for input Soviet troops to Poland took place later. But Molotov answered Schulenburg on September 5 that “at the right time” the USSR “will be absolutely necessary to begin concrete actions,” but the Soviet Union was in no hurry to take action.
Moreover, on September 14, Molotov stated that for the USSR “it would be extremely important not to begin to act before the fall administrative center Poland - Warsaw." And it is likely that if effective action is taken Polish army against Germany, and even more so in the event of a real, and not formal, entry into the war by England and France, the Soviet Union would generally abandon the idea of annexing Western Ukraine and Belarus. At least at this stage. But in reality, the Allies did not provide any help to Poland, which was falling apart.
By September 17, both the military and civilian Polish authorities had lost any control over the country, and the army was a scattered group of troops. The Germans reached the line Osowiec - Bialystok - Bielsk - Kamenets-Litovsk - Brest-Litovsk - Wlodawa - Lublin - Vladimir-Volynsky - Zamosc - Lviv - Sambir, thereby already occupying about half of the territory of Poland, occupying Krakow, Lodz, Gdansk, Lublin, Brest, Katowice, Torun. Warsaw has been under siege since September 14. On September 1, President I. Moscicki left the city, and on September 5, the government left the city, which finally left the country on September 17. Commander-in-Chief E. Rydz-Smigly held out in Warsaw the longest, but he also left the city on the night of September 7th, moving to Brest. However, Rydz-Smigly did not stay there for long: on September 10, the headquarters was moved to Vladimir-Volynsky, on the 13th - to Mlynov, and on the 15th - to Kolomyia near the Romanian border. Of course, the commander-in-chief could not lead the troops normally in such conditions. And this only exacerbated the chaos that arose as a result of the rapid advance of the Germans and confusion at the front.
Thus, in view of the effective actions of the Germans, the disorganization of the army and the inability of the leadership to organize the defense of the state, by September 17, the defeat of Poland was completely inevitable. It is significant that even the British and French general staffs, in a report prepared on September 22, noted that the USSR began to invade Poland only when its final defeat became obvious.
What alternatives did the Soviet Union have? Not to send troops into Poland? Why on earth? As mentioned above, the Polish army practically ceased resistance, the Germans moved unhindered to the borders of the USSR. Thus, on September 18, Deputy Chief of Staff of the OKW Operations Directorate V. Warlimont showed the acting USSR military attache in Germany Belyakov a map on which Lviv was part of the future territory of the Reich. After the USSR presented claims, the Germans attributed everything to Warlimont’s personal initiative. But it is very hard to believe that he drew maps contrary to the instructions received from the Reich leadership. If on September 17 the Red Army had not crossed the border of Poland, then two years later german army would have been 200 kilometers closer to Moscow. And who knows what results this would have led to.
Moreover, the need for a Soviet invasion of Poland was also recognized in the West. Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, said in a radio speech on October 1 that “Russia is pursuing a cold policy of self-interest. We would prefer that the Russian armies stand in their present positions as friends and allies of Poland, and not as invaders. But to protect Russia from the Nazi threat, it was clearly necessary for the Russian armies to stand on this line. In any case, this line exists and is therefore created Eastern front, which Nazi Germany would not dare to attack."
The most interesting thing is that neither England nor France declared war on the USSR despite allied obligations to Poland. On September 18, at a meeting of the British government, it was decided not to even protest against the actions of the Soviet Union, since England assumed obligations to defend Poland only from Germany. On September 23, People's Commissar of Internal Affairs L.P. Beria informed the People's Commissar of Defense K.E. Voroshilov that “the resident of the NKVD of the USSR in London reported that on September 20 of this year. The British Foreign Office sent a telegram to all British embassies and press attachés, indicating that England not only does not intend to declare war on the Soviet Union now, but must remain on the best possible terms.” And on October 17, the British announced that London wants to see an ethnographic Poland of modest size and there can be no talk of returning Western Ukraine and Western Belarus to it. Thus, the Allies essentially legitimized the actions of the Soviet Union on Polish territory.
We should also not forget that the Soviet Union, in fact, regained the lands captured by the Poles in the 20s. Lands inhabited by ethnic Ukrainians and Belarusians, towards whom Pilsudski's government pursued a harsh colonization policy. So the annexation of Western Ukraine and Belarus in 1939 was not only expedient, but also fair.
Let's move on to considering military operations directly. On September 17, Soviet troops with the forces of the Ukrainian (under the command of Army Commander 1st Rank S.K. Timoshenko) and Belorussian (under the command of Army Commander 2nd Rank M.P. Kovalev) fronts invaded eastern regions Poland. Only some border guard posts offered resistance. By the evening of September 18, Soviet units approached Vilna. By the 20th the city was taken. The losses of the Soviet army amounted to 13 people killed and 24 wounded, 5 tanks and 4 armored vehicles were destroyed. About 10 thousand Poles surrendered. It is typical that the resistance for the most part did not provide regular army, and the local police, formed from students and high school students.
Meanwhile, the 36th Tank Brigade occupied Dubno at 7 o'clock on September 18, where the rear units of the 18th and 26th Polish infantry divisions were disarmed. In total, 6 thousand military personnel were captured; the trophies of the Soviet troops were 12 guns, 70 machine guns, 3 thousand rifles, 50 vehicles and 6 trains with weapons.
An interesting incident occurred on the outskirts of Grodno. September 20 motorized group of the 16th rifle corps under the command of brigade commander Rozanova encountered a Polish detachment (about 200 people) suppressing an anti-Polish uprising local population(I think it’s not difficult to guess about his ethnic composition). 17 were killed in this punitive raid local residents, of which 2 were teenagers, 13 and 16 years old. A fierce battle ensued, in which armed local residents took an active part. The hatred towards the Poles was very strong.
On September 22, Grodno surrendered. And again, it is characteristic that already on the 18th, anti-Polish protests began in the city.
The strength of the “resistance” of the Polish army is very well demonstrated by the ratio of those killed and those who surrendered. So throughout the entire campaign, the Polish army lost 3,500 people killed. At the same time, 454,700 soldiers and officers surrendered. Soviet army lost 1,173 people killed.
At the end of September, the Soviet and German armies met at Lvov, Lublin and Bialystok. Moreover, several armed clashes occurred, which led to minor losses on both sides.
Thus, in just a month, the Polish state ceased to exist. The Soviet Union significantly moved its borders to the west and united almost all ethnic Ukrainian and Belarusian lands. The first stage of the Second World War has ended.
70 years ago, in September 1939, Western Ukraine, which was then part of Poland, came Soviet authority. In less than two weeks, the territories of Ternopil, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv regions and Volyn became part of the USSR. Now this period is talked about exclusively as the beginning of the “dark times”, the Soviet occupation. Forgetting, however, that it was then that Ukraine essentially established itself within its modern borders.
Today we will try to remember what Western Ukraine was like before the “occupation” and what it became after.
The territories annexed to the USSR in 1939 were captured by Poland after the defeat of the Red Army in 1921. In the territories annexed in this way, the Polish government began to pursue a harsh policy of colonization and polonization, not caring about “human rights” or “European values.” However, the times were cruel then and the Poles acted exactly the same way as the Germans, French or British would have acted in their place. Now they like to highlight the “repressions” of the totalitarian Soviet regime, although very often the actions of the Soviet authorities were much softer and more humane than European democracies in similar conditions.
Some facts.
Ukrainian units that participated on the side of the Poles in the fight against the Red Army were interned and thrown into camps behind barbed wire. Ukrainians were not allowed to study on Ukrainian territory. So ethnic Ukrainian could theoretically enter a university in Krakow, Warsaw or Poznan (though only theoretically, in reality there were not many such cases), but admission to Lviv University was prohibited.
Here are excerpts from the resolution of the congress of Ukrainians in Canada in 1924: “In Galicia alone, the Polish-gentry government closed 682 public schools, 3 teachers’ seminaries and 7 private gymnasiums... In the Ukrainian provinces of Volyn and Polesie, where there are only 8% of the Polish population, out of 2694 public schools only 400 Ukrainians and they are mercilessly Polonized.”
In 1918, there were 3,600 Ukrainian schools in Western Ukraine. By 1939, there were only 461 of them left, of which 41 were private. But even in Ukrainian schools, the teaching of history and geography was carried out exclusively in Polish language(isn't it true, there is a lot in common with educational policy in modern Ukraine). But the closure of schools and the Polishization of the Ukrainian population were not the worst disasters.
Along the new Polish-Soviet border, the Polish government began to allocate land to its veterans. This was done with the aim of increasing Polish influence in territories inhabited by ethnic Ukrainians.
Only 1% of the electricity generated in Poland came from Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. But in Western Ukraine alone there were more than half of the total number of prisons in all of Poland - 187 out of 330. Three-quarters of all executions in Poland occurred in the “Eastern Cress”.
Naturally, all this led to the emergence of organized resistance. In 1930, the uprising began to gain strength, which engulfed the Lvov, Stanislav, Ternopil and Volyn voivodeships. It’s interesting, but during the uprising OUN militants and communists acted together. The estates of the siege-colonists burned throughout Western Ukraine. In response, the Polish government carried out the so-called “pacification”. Detachments of Polish police and cavalry disarmed 800 villages, arresting about 5 thousand participants in the anti-Polish movement. 50 people were killed, 4 thousand were maimed, 500 Ukrainian houses were burned. The Minister of Internal Affairs of Poland, Slavoj-Skladowski, later admitted: “if it were not for pacification, then in Western Ukraine we would have had an armed uprising, to suppress which guns and divisions of soldiers would have been needed.”
Is it any wonder that after all this the Red Army in 1939 was greeted with flowers, and Polish officers in literally asked to put them in jail and strengthen security so as not to become the main ones actors at the lynchings that the local Ukrainian population was going to arrange for them.
To complete the picture, it is worth mentioning the “most Ukrainian” city in Ukraine - Lviv. According to the 1931 census, the population was distributed according to ethnicity as follows (belonging to a particular nationality was determined by spoken language):
- Ukrainians 24,245 people. or 7.8%
- Rusyns 10,892 people. or 3.5%
- Poles 198,212 people. or 63.5%
- Jews 75,316 people. or 24.1%
- other 3,566 people or 1.1%
But 45% of Ukrainians were employed as domestic servants, Jews - 4%. Of the working Ukrainian women, 64% worked as domestic servants, of the working Polish women - 25%, of Jewish women - 5%.
As for the richest residents of the city, those who used hired labor, they and their family members made up 6% of the total population of the city, 11% of the Jewish, 4% of the Polish and 2% of the Ukrainian population.
And here is an excerpt from the memoirs of a native Lviv resident, 89-year-old Lyubov Yatsenko: “ Indigenous people They were hired only as janitors, watchmen and domestic servants. The lords disparagingly called the Ukrainians “cattle”, and sometimes they weren’t even allowed on the tram. All important positions (lawyers, doctors, teachers, city government employees, railway) were the privilege of Poles and Jews."
These figures are well known, but this does not prevent the current Ukrainian manipulators from history from declaring that Soviet power destroyed color Ukrainian nation, intellectual elite, intelligentsia, etc. Apparently, Ukrainian intellectuals disguised themselves as servants and laborers.
After the end of the Great Patriotic War The situation in Western Ukraine and Lviv in particular began to change radically. In 1945-1946, factories dismantled in various regions of the USSR were located in Lvov: electric lamp, telegraph equipment, tool, and agricultural machinery. Construction of a large bus plant began.
Many new enterprises were built in other areas. In total, by the end of the Fourth Five-Year Plan, 70 large (number of workers over 300) plants and factories and hundreds of small ones were already operating in the western regions. And if the level of Ukrainian industry by 1950 exceeded the pre-war level by only 15 percent, then gross output in the western regions increased during this time by 115%, and in the Lviv region by as much as 241%!
Has undergone significant changes sectoral structure industry western regions. Thus, mechanical engineering and metalworking products were produced in comparison with pre-war years in the Volyn region it is 20 times more, in the Ternopil region - 18 times, in the Lviv region - 19 times.
The development of industry required appropriate specialists who came from the Eastern regions of Ukraine and from Russia. Thus, 20 thousand workers and about 2 thousand engineers arrived in Lvov during the fourth five-year plan. But the newcomers could not satisfy the needs of industry for workers, especially since in the east they were needed no less. Therefore, it was urgently necessary to raise the level of education of the residents of Western Ukraine (which, as mentioned above, was in a very deplorable state). To solve this problem, about 10 thousand representatives of the intelligentsia came to the western regions to combat illiteracy, organize health care, open schools, libraries, reading rooms, etc. By the way, it was these people, honest and selfless idealists, who took the brunt of the UPA militants’ blow. Although less than 10% of them were Komsomol activists or party members. And they did not come to instill ideology, but only to teach and heal.
Let's return to our topic. As construction proceeds in Western Ukraine industrial enterprises, the opening of new educational institutions, the population of cities grew, mostly due to people from rural areas, who, while receiving an education, joined the ranks of the working class and intelligentsia. It was the Soviet government that was “to blame” for the fact that Lvov and other large cities in Western Ukraine became truly Ukrainian. And Ukrainians have ceased to be servants, second-class citizens and have taken their rightful place in industry, science, education, and medicine.
However, now Ukraine is rapidly getting rid of the legacy of its “totalitarian past.” If this continues, then very soon we will return to the pre-war level. And our children, instead of becoming doctors, scientists, and military personnel, at best, will become janitors or servants for foreign lords.
Blitzkrieg in Poland
The lightning defeat of the Polish army was an extremely unpleasant surprise for the Soviet leadership, which at first did not intend to conduct military operations in Poland. W. Shirer in his work “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” stated: “ The government in the Kremlin, like the governments of other countries, was stunned by the speed with which the German armies swept through Poland" This is true.
September 8, when the German tank divisions reached the outskirts of Warsaw, Ribbentrop sent an “urgent, top secret” message to Schulenburg in Moscow that the success of operations in Poland had exceeded “all expectations” and that in the circumstances Germany would like to know about “in military intentions of the Soviet government" The next day V. Molotov replied that “ Russia will use armed forces in the coming days... Poland was falling apart, and as a result, the Soviet Union had a need to come to the aid of the Ukrainians and Belarusians».
On September 12, Hitler, in a conversation with the Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces, Colonel General Brauchitsch, said: “ The Russians obviously do not want to speak out... The Russians believe that the Poles will agree to make peace" However, despite the facts, Professor R. Zhugzda groundlessly believed that the Polish “ The campaign of the Red Army was a surprise for Germany and caused its concern: it cut off the Reich from Romanian oil and did not allow it to gain a foothold in Galicia».
Hitler wanted to force the Soviet Union to officially enter the war. A. Orlov noted: “ Immediately after England and France entered the war, Ribbentrop persistently suggested that the USSR send its troops to Poland».
What is the reason for this persistence? If the Soviet government then began to act on Hitler’s inherently provocative prompt and immediately sent its troops into Poland, this could have led to grave military-political consequences for us. Then, as domestic military historians rightly note, “ there were no guarantees that England and France would not declare war on the USSR if the Red Army crossed the Soviet-Polish border" If something like this happens Western democracies would declare the USSR the same aggressor as Germany, which would seriously increase the chances of making peace with England and France and quickly freeing all the Wehrmacht forces to carry out the main task Hitler's leadership- conquest of living space in the east. Even the famous critic of the Soviet leadership led by Stalin, L. Bezymensky, admitted: USSR “ would find himself isolated in a future clash with Germany. However, the Soviet Union was quite careful».
Under pressure from A. Yakovlev and the anti-Soviet leaders led by him The Supreme Council The USSR in 1989 condemned the secret protocols on the spheres of influence of Germany and the Soviet Union. However, V. Sidak, in his publications in Pravda and other publications, including scientific ones, proved that the documents presented to the deputies by the Yakovlev commission were fakes. This is especially obvious after his first publication in Pravda on June 16, 2011 of full-scale images of the original Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and those forgeries that under this name have repeatedly appeared in the foreign and Russian press. Serious evidence that there were no “secret protocols” was also provided by G. Perevozchikov-Khmury in “Soviet Russia”.
But if we assume that “secret protocols” did exist, then even in this case, only those who neglect the most complex historical reality can castigate the Soviet leadership as much as they like from the standpoint of some abstract ideal.
On September 8, 1939, the US Ambassador to Poland reported to Washington: “ The Polish government leaves Poland... and goes through Romania... to France" What should the Soviet leadership have done when the Polish government fled and the Germans were approaching Brest and Lvov? Allow them to occupy Western Belarus, Western Ukraine, the Baltic states and start a war against us by attacking Minsk and Leningrad?
On September 14, 1999, the anti-Russian Memorial considered our defense of Western Belarus and Western Ukraine “a tragedy for their inhabitants” and called on the Russian leadership to “publicly call it a crime.” But in 1939, former British Prime Minister Lloyd George wrote Polish Ambassador in London: " The USSR occupied territories that were not Polish and that were taken by force by Poland after the First World War... It would be an act of madness to put the Russian advance on the same level as the German advance" Churchill foresaw military clash between Germany and the USSR. Therefore, speaking on the radio on October 1, 1939, he actually justified the entry of Soviet troops into Poland: “ To protect Russia from the Nazi threat, it was clearly necessary for the Russian armies to stand on this line».
Meanwhile, A. Yakovlev stated in December 1989 that the Soviet Union entered the Second World War not in 1941, but in September 1939. This false idea was picked up by other anti-Soviet activists. Thus, A. Nekrich writes in his book “1941, June 22”: “ In the first period of the war, the Soviet Union had an incomplete military-political alliance with Germany. It should be considered incomplete since no formal military alliance was concluded" In his opinion, Soviet troops actually fought on the side of Germany: “P Poland fell, its territories were divided between Germany and the USSR. ...Thus, the Soviet Union entered the Second World War on September 17, 1939, and not on June 22, 1941, as is commonly believed...“Here it is, a typical falsification of history.
Western Ukraine and Western Belarus welcome liberators
Let's go back to early autumn 1939. By September 17 German troops defeated the main groups of the Polish army, which lost 66,300 killed and 133,700 wounded in the battles. On September 17, Red Army units entered Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. The Soviet government outlined the reasons for this step in a note handed to the Polish ambassador in Moscow W. Grzybowski:
« The Polish-German War revealed internal inconsistency Polish state. Within ten days of military operations, Poland lost all its industrial areas and cultural centers. Warsaw as the capital of Poland no longer exists. The Polish government has collapsed and shows no signs of life. This means that the Polish state and its government virtually ceased to exist. Thus, the agreements concluded between the USSR and Poland ceased to apply. Left to its own devices and left without leadership, Poland turned into a convenient field for all sorts of accidents and surprises that could pose a threat to the USSR. Therefore, being hitherto neutral, the Soviet government can no longer treat these facts neutrally. The Soviet government cannot also be indifferent to the fact that half-blooded Ukrainians and Belarusians living on the territory of Poland, abandoned to the mercy of fate, remain defenseless. In view of this situation, the Soviet government ordered the High Command of the Red Army to order troops to cross the border and take under their protection the lives and property of the population of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus».
The Polish Supreme Commander, Marshal Edward Rydz-Smigly, on September 17-18 ordered his troops: “ Do not engage in battles with the Soviets, resist only if they attempt to disarm our units that came into contact with Soviet troops. Continue the fight with the Germans. The surrounded cities must fight. If Soviet troops approach, negotiate with them in order to achieve the withdrawal of our garrisons to Romania and Hungary" The bulk of the Polish troops surrendered in entire formations. From September 17 to October 2, 1939, 452,536 people were disarmed, including 18,729 officers. In short-term battles against Soviet troops, units of the Polish army and gendarmerie lost 3,500 killed and 20,000 wounded. During this period, our army irretrievably lost 1,475 people.
The arrival of Soviet troops not only warned, but in some cases stopped the flaring up massacre of people of Polish nationality. On September 20, in his report, the head of the Political Directorate of the Red Army L. Mehlis noted that the Polish officers “ They fear the Ukrainian peasants and population like fire, who became more active with the arrival of the Red Army and are cracking down on Polish officers. It got to the point that in Bursztyn, Polish officers, sent by the corps to school and guarded by a small guard, asked to increase the number of soldiers guarding them as prisoners, in order to avoid possible reprisals against them by the population».
V. Berezhkov, now living in the USA, recalled in his book “Next to Stalin”: “ As a witness to the events that took place in the fall of 1939, I cannot forget the atmosphere that reigned in those days in Western Belarus and Western Ukraine. We were greeted with flowers, bread and salt, treated to fruits and milk. In small private cafes, Soviet officers were fed for free. Those were genuine feelings. The Red Army was seen as protection against Hitler's terror. Something similar happened in the Baltic states" In 1999, the peoples of Belarus and Ukraine celebrated the 60th anniversary of their reunification as a great holiday.
On October 22, 1939, elections were held People's Assemblies Western Belarus and Western Ukraine. 92.83% of the population of Western Ukraine took part in the voting, of which 90.93% voted for the nominated candidates. In Western Belarus, 96.71% of the population participated in the elections. Of these, 90.67% voted for candidates who supported Soviet power. On October 27, the People's Assembly of Western Ukraine unanimously adopted a declaration on the establishment of Soviet power and on joining the Soviet Union. On October 29, the People's Assembly of Western Belarus made the same decision. The fifth, extraordinary session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on November 1 adopted a resolution on the inclusion of Western Ukraine into the Ukrainian SSR, and on November 2 - on the inclusion of Western Belarus into the Belarusian SSR.
Yu. Afanasyev appreciated “ signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in August 1939; parade of Soviet and German troops in Brest in the fall of the same year; the occupation of the Baltic states, Western Ukraine, Western Belarus and Bessarabia in 1940; Stalin's congratulations to Hitler on each of his victories in Europe, up to June 1941; toasts in honor of the Fuhrer in the Kremlin...as the actual participation of the USSR until mid-1941 in the war on the side of Germany against Western allies " But we have to repeat once again that the USSR was forced to conclude an agreement with Germany. There were no “joint military actions” between German and Soviet troops in Poland.
The question of the “victory parade” in Brest, which was “hosted” by General Guderian and Brigade Commander Krivoshein, also remains speculative. For the Red Army, the “parade” was a “diplomatic” step to avoid undesirable consequences. The same goal, according to Nezavisimaya Gazeta, “was pursued by Stalin’s toasts and congratulations to Hitler.” The fact is that Hitler intended to capture most of the Baltic states. On September 25, 1939, he signed secret directive No. 4, which provided “ V East Prussia keep forces in combat readiness sufficient to quickly capture Lithuania even in the event of armed resistance" Inclusion in Nazi Europe did not bode well for the Baltic peoples. The head of the SS G. Himmler in 1942 put forward the task of “total Germanization” of the Baltic states within 20 years.
In the fall of 1939, the USSR concluded mutual assistance agreements with Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia and, on their basis, sent its troops into these states. This strengthened the security of our northern western borders, significantly helped preparations to repel Hitler’s aggression.
Currently, the West is shouting hysterically about the criminal occupation of the three Baltic republics by the USSR in 1940. In fact, there the masses swept away the pro-German governments, established Soviet power and decided to join the USSR. Y. Emelyanov writes about this convincingly - on the basis of historical documents - in the article “Occupation or Revolution?” On July 26, 1940, the London Times noted that “ The unanimous decision to join Soviet Russia" of the Baltic peoples "reflects... not pressure from Moscow, but a sincere recognition that such an exit is a better alternative than inclusion in the new Nazi Europe».
Liberation of Bessarabia
K. Kolikov, who does not know history well, announced that the USSR attacked Bessarabia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. He didn't attack them. Bessarabia never belonged to Romania. Taking advantage of our weakness at that time, Romania captured it in 1918, but in 1940 the USSR returned Bessarabia to itself, restoring historical justice. But for some reason B. Sokolov (apparently in a sleepy state) decided that we “ it is worth apologizing to Romania for aggression and occupation».
In October 1939, Churchill told the Soviet plenipotentiary Maisky: “ From the point of view of correctly understood interests of England, the fact that the entire east and south-east of Europe are outside the war zone has not a negative, but positive value. Mainly, England has no reason to object to the actions of the USSR in the Baltic states. Of course, some sentimental figures may shed tears over a Russian protectorate over Estonia or Latvia, but this cannot be taken seriously" He admitted: " In favor of the Soviets, it must be said that it was vital for the Soviet Union to move as far west as possible starting positions German armies so that the Russians would have time and could gather forces from all corners of their colossal empire. If their policy was coldly calculating, it was also at that moment in high degree realistic».
Failed compromise
The Soviet-Finnish border was only 32 kilometers from Leningrad. Our government suggested that the Finns move the border away from this city. L. Hart reasoned: “R the Russians wanted to provide better cover for the land approaches to Leningrad by moving the Finnish border to Karelian Isthmus so much so that Leningrad was out of danger of heavy artillery fire. This boundary change did not affect the main defensive structures Mannerheim lines... In exchange for all these territorial changes, the Soviet Union offered to cede the areas of Rebola and Porayorpi to Finland. This exchange, even in accordance with the Finnish White Paper, gave Finland additional territory in 2134 sq. miles as compensation for the cession of territories to Russia with total area 1066 sq. miles.
An objective examination of these requirements shows that they were drawn up in accordance with rational basis to ensure greater security for Russian territory without causing any serious damage to the security of Finland. Of course, all this would prevent Germany from using Finland as a springboard for an attack on Russia. At the same time, Russia did not receive any advantage for attacking Finland. In fact, the areas that Russia proposed to cede to Finland would expand the latter’s borders at the narrowest point of its territory. However, the Finns rejected this proposal too.».
After this, the Soviet government decided to achieve a safer border for Leningrad through military means. It is unlikely that V. Novobranets’ idea that there is a war with Finland is correct. was not an objective necessity. This was Stalin’s personal whim, caused by reasons that are still unclear" The ardent “democrat” S. Lipkin asked a ridiculous question: “ Why shortly before greatest war We failed to defeat the small army of Finland?“If we didn’t defeat her, then why did she give the Karelian Isthmus and the city of Vyborg to the Soviet Union? Another thing is that this victory in the war with the Finns was far from being as brilliant as the Soviet command had hoped for.
Higher political leadership The USSR initially misjudged Finland's military potential. The Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army, Marshal of the Soviet Union B. Shaposhnikov, summoned to the Military Council to discuss the planned war against Finland, presented a plan that took into account the real capabilities of the Finnish army and sober assessment difficulties in breaking through its fortified areas. " And in accordance with this, - Marshal of the Soviet Union A. Vasilevsky later recalled, - he assumed the concentration of large forces and means necessary for decisive success this operation. When Shaposhnikov named all these planned General Staff forces and means that had to be concentrated before the start of this operation, Stalin laughed at him. It was said something like that, they say, in order to cope with this very... Finland, you require such enormous forces and resources. On such a scale there is no need for them».
Our army launched an offensive with insufficient forces and means, suffered heavy losses, and only a month later approached the Mannerheim line. When the question of the further conduct of the war was discussed at the Military Council, “ Shaposhnikov reported essentially the same plan that he reported a month ago" He was accepted. The newly launched operation was a complete success; the Mannerheim line was quickly broken through.
At the headquarters of the commander of the Finnish troops, Marshal Mannerheim, there was a representative of Gamelin, General Clément-Grancourt. According to a member of the French military mission, Captain P. Stelen, the main task French representatives was to “keep Finland in a state of war with all our might.” On March 19, 1940, Daladier declared in Parliament that for France " The Moscow Peace Treaty is a tragic and shameful event. This is a great victory for Russia».
Hitler wrote to Mussolini on March 8, 1940 about the Soviet-Finnish War: “ Taking into account the possibilities of maneuver and supply, no force in the world could achieve such results in frosts of 30-40 degrees, which the Russians achieved at the very beginning of the war" It is interesting how Hitler explained the failure of the German blitzkrieg on April 12, 1942: “In The entire war with Finland in 1940, as well as the Russian entry into Poland with outdated tanks and weapons and soldiers dressed out of uniform, is nothing more than a grandiose disinformation campaign, since Russia at one time had the weapons that made it along with Germany and Japan a world power" An interesting zigzag in the Fuhrer's thoughts. What explains it?
Doctor historical sciences A. Orlov considers the Soviet-Finnish war “ in a certain sense, “unnecessary”, generated by the political miscalculations of both countries" But many more miscalculations were made by the Finnish rulers, who then pursued a short-sighted foreign policy.
The oath of the Finnish officer included the following solemn words: “ Just as I believe in one God, I believe in Greater Finland and her great future" A prominent public figure in Finland, Väine Voinomaa, wrote to his son about how the chairman of the Social Democratic faction in the Finnish parliament, Tanner, said on June 19, 1941: “ The very existence of Russia is unjustified, and it must be eliminated», « Peter will be wiped off the face of the earth." Finnish borders, according to President Ryti, will be established along the Svir to Lake Onega and from there to White Sea, “Stalin’s channel remains on the Finnish side" Such aggressive plans were supported by a considerable part of the Finnish population.
July 10, 1941, Commander-in-Chief of the Finnish Armed Forces K. Mannerheim, former general Tsarist Russia, ordered them "oh free the lands of the Karelians" After difficult battles with the Finns on October 1, 1941, our troops were forced to leave Petrozavodsk. In a note to the United States on November 11, 1941, the Finnish government stated: " Finland seeks to neutralize and occupy the enemy’s offensive positions, including those lying beyond the 1939 borders. It would have been imperative for Finland, and in the interests of the effectiveness of its defense, to take such measures already in 1939 during the first phase of the war, if only its forces were sufficient for this».
By the way, let us point out: out of the 20,000 Russian population of Petrozavodsk, captured by the Finns in 1941, 19,000 were in a concentration camp, where they were fed “two-day old horse corpses.” Isn’t this what B. Sokolov meant when he called us “ apologize to Finland"? In vain he thinks that “ Finland's position could have been completely different in 1941. Perhaps even neutral" We must not forget that the Finnish government dreamed of creating a great Finland.
« Indeed, did the victory in the Finnish campaign strengthen the security of the USSR in general and Leningrad in particular? - reasoned B. Sokolov. - There is only one answer: no, it didn’t strengthen, but, on the contrary, weakened" He tries to find arguments in favor of this conclusion: “ In June 1941, Finnish troops, together with the Nazis, attacked the Soviet Union and on August 31 captured the notorious village of Mainila. In just two or three months, the Finns reached the previous border on the Karelian Isthmus and even crossed it, which, however, did not cause the fall of Leningrad».
But this author, caught in the anti-Soviet miasma, did not try to answer very significant questions. What would have happened if Finnish troops had launched an offensive from the previous border? Where would they be in two or three months? Berezhkov correctly posed the question: “ What would have happened if the border with Finland had been where it was before the spring of 1940? Another question: would Leningrad have survived? This means that there was something in it, which means we cannot say that we only lost, discredited ourselves».
Noting that as a result of the victory over the Finns of the USSR, “the improved its strategic position in the northwest and north, created the prerequisites for ensuring the security of Leningrad and the Murmansk railway", A. Orlov considered that " territorial gains of 1939-1940 turned into major political losses" But it can be unmistakably stated that they were more than covered by the fact that German troops attacked us from positions 300-400 kilometers away from the old borders. In November 1941 they approached Moscow. Where would they be if the Soviet Union had not pushed the border to the west?
L. Bezymensky, condemning the policies of the Soviet government in 1939 and 1940, said: “ Stalin, it seemed, could triumph. But the price of the resulting delay turned out to be terrible. After June 22, 1941, Wehrmacht divisions quickly passed through areas of Western Belarus, Western Ukraine and the Baltic states, which the Red Army did not have time to master and adapt to defense».
Would our country have been better off if we had not achieved this “delay”? If the German armed forces had launched an offensive against Soviet troops in 1939 from positions near Leningrad, Minsk and near Kyiv? Bezymensky chose not to touch upon this inevitable and fundamentally important question. And without an answer to it, the professor’s reasoning and assessments lose their evidence.
Colonel General V. Cherevatov correctly concluded: “ Hitler, even before the start of hostilities against the USSR, lost to I.V. For Stalin the two most important strategic operations- the battle for Space and the battle for Time, which doomed itself to defeat already in 1941».
"Sitting" war
England and France declared war on Germany, which attacked Poland. Observers called it either a "sitty" or a "bizarre" war. In fact, it became, in its essence, an unambiguous attempt to continue the failed policy of “appeasement” of the aggressor. German command announced that from September 1939 to May 1940, the German army lost Western Front only 196 people killed, 356 people wounded, 144 people missing, and 11 aircraft. This development of events confirmed the correctness of the Soviet government’s assessment of the position of England and France, which, wishing to avoid real war with Germany, they wanted to pit it against the Soviet Union.
During the Soviet-Finnish War, Western European States. For this purpose, it was decided to form an expeditionary force of 150,000 people to be sent to Finland, as well as to bomb Soviet oil fields in Baku, Maikop, and Grozny. On March 12, 1940, Prime Minister Daladier announced that France had supplied Finland with 145 aircraft, 496 guns, 5,000 machine guns, 400,000 rifles and 20 million cartridges. Chamberlain reported on March 19 in the British Parliament that 101 aircraft, 114 guns, 185,000 shells, 200 anti-tank guns, 100 Vickers machine guns, 50,000 gas shells, 15,700 aerial bombs, and a lot of uniforms and equipment were sent from England to Finland. 11,600 foreign volunteers arrived in Finland. Among them there were 8,680 Swedes, 944 Danes, 693 Norwegians, 364 American Finns and 346 Hungarians.
French headquarters developed a plan of military action against the USSR, which included an Anglo-French landing in Pechenga (Petsamo) and air strikes on important targets in Soviet territory. IN memo Chief of the General Staff of the French Navy, Admiral Darlan, to Prime Minister E. Daladier, the need for such an operation was justified as follows: “In In the Murmansk region and in Karelia, thousands of political exiles are being held, and the inhabitants of the concentration camps there are ready to rebel against their oppressors. Karelia could eventually become a place where anti-Stalinist forces within the country could unite».
The Deputy Chief of the French General Staff of the Air Force, General Bergerie, said in December 1939 that the Anglo-French allies would launch an attack on the Soviet Union not only in the north, in Finland, but also in the south, in Transcaucasia. " General Weygand commands troops in Syria and Lebanon. His forces will advance in general direction to Baku in order to deprive the USSR of the oil produced here. From here Weygand's troops will advance towards the Allies advancing on Moscow from Scandinavia and Finland».
« “I was surprised and flattered,” P. Stelen wrote in his memoirs, “that I was confidentially introduced to an operation of such a large scale. The idea of the operation was expressed on the map by two curved arrows: the first from Finland, the second from Syria. The sharpened tips of these arrows connected in the area east of Moscow" These projects, amazing in their stupidity, distracted the British and French from the most important thing - the real strengthening of their defense.
Alexander OGNEV.
Front-line soldier, professor, honored scientist.
The myth of the voluntary accession of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus to the USSR
The main myth associated with the so-called “liberation campaign” of the Red Army in Western Ukraine and Western Belarus in September 1939 was undertaken with the aim of saving the Ukrainians and Belarusians of Poland from German occupation after the defeat of the Polish army. At the same time, it was denied that Soviet troops entered Poland in pursuance of a secret additional protocol to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, according to which the eastern provinces of Poland were transferred to the Soviet sphere of interest. It was also alleged that Soviet troops crossed the Soviet-Polish border precisely on September 17 because on that day the Polish government and the main command of the army left the country. In fact, on this day the Polish government and the commander-in-chief, Marshal Edward Rydz-Smigly, were still on Polish territory, although they had left Warsaw.
According to the Soviet propaganda myth, the population of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus overwhelmingly welcomed the arrival of the Red Army and unanimously supported joining the USSR.
In fact National composition population of the annexed territories was such that it excluded the possibility that the majority of residents would be in favor of joining the USSR. In 1938 in Poland, according to official statistics, out of 35 million inhabitants there were 24 million Poles, 5 million Ukrainians, and 1.4 million Belarusians. However, on Stalin’s instructions, Pravda wrote about 8 million Ukrainians and 3 million Belarusians in the Red Army. Army of the Ukrainian and Belarusian voivodeships. Elections to the People's Assemblies of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus took place there. Elections were held according to the principle: one person per seat. Only communists and their allies were nominated as deputies, and any agitation against them was prohibited. In October 1939, the People's Assemblies proclaimed Soviet power and appealed to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR with a request for reunification with Ukraine and Belarus, which was granted in November.
Stalin did not hold a plebiscite on joining the USSR in Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. There was no certainty that the majority of the population of the liberated territories would vote for joining the USSR, and it was unlikely that anyone in the world would recognize its obviously falsified results. According to the 1931 census, 5.6 million Poles, 4.3 million Ukrainians, 1.7 million Belarusians, 1.1 million Jews, 126 thousand Russians, 87 thousand Germans and 136 thousand lived in Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. representatives of other nationalities. In Western Belarus, Poles predominated in Bialystok (66.9%), Vilna (59.7%) and Novogrudok (52.4%) voivodeships, Belarusians - only in Polesie (69.2%). 2.3 million Poles, 1.7 million Belarusians and 452 thousand Jews lived in Western Belarus. In Western Ukrainian voivodeships, Poles predominated in Lviv (57.7%) and Tarnopol (49.7%) voivodeships (in Tarnopol voivodeship, Ukrainians made up 45.5%), Ukrainians - in Volyn (68.4%) and Stanislavovsky (68.9%). %). 3.3 million Poles, 4.3 million Ukrainians and 628 thousand Jews lived in Western Ukraine.
In Western Ukraine, the illegal Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), which advocated the independence of Ukraine, was popular. OUN members fought against the Polish authorities, including using terrorist methods. They also attacked Soviet representatives. No less hostile than towards the Poles, Ukrainian nationalists belonged to Soviet power. In Western Belarus there was no noticeable Belarusian national movement. But a significant part of the Belarusian population of Western Belarus were Catholic Belarusians, who were culturally and politically oriented toward the Poles. And the Poles made up about half the population of Western Belarus.
The Ukrainian and Belarusian population in Poland (mostly peasants) fought for their national rights, but did not intend to join the USSR, having heard about terror and famine. And Ukrainians and Belarusians lived in Poland more prosperously than the poor Soviet collective farmers. Nevertheless, the invasion of the Red Army was perceived calmly, and even enthusiastically by the Jews, who were threatened by Hitler's genocide. However, the measures of the Soviet government quickly led to the fact that in 1941, Ukrainians and Belarusians greeted the Germans with bread and salt, as liberators from the Bolsheviks.
Polish general Wladislaw Anders cited in his memoirs the stories of Lvov residents about how the Bolsheviks “robbed not only private but also state property,” how the NKVD penetrated into all spheres of life, about crowds of refugees who, having learned what it was like to live under the Bolsheviks, despite the Why, they want to go to lands occupied by the Germans.
There were many facts of looting and arbitrary executions by soldiers and commanders of the Red Army.
The commanders guilty of arbitrary executions did not suffer any serious punishment. People's Commissar of Defense Kliment Voroshilov simply reprimanded them, pointing out that there was no deliberate ill will in the actions of those guilty of illegal actions, that all this happened “in a situation of hostilities and acute class and national struggle local Ukrainian and Jewish population with former Polish gendarmes and officers."
Often the killings of Poles were carried out by the local Ukrainian and Belarusian population. Secretary of the Brest Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Belarus. Kiselev said in April 1940: “There were many such murders of the sworn enemies of the people, committed in the anger of the people in the first days of the arrival of the Red Army. We justify them, we are on the side of those who, having emerged from captivity, dealt with their enemy.”
Mass forced collectivization began in Western Ukrainian and Western Belarusian lands even before June 22, 1941. The intelligentsia was accused of “bourgeois nationalism” and repressed. Before the start of the Great Patriotic War, 108 thousand people, mostly Poles, were arrested on the territory of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. A significant part of them were shot on the eve and in the first weeks of the Great Patriotic War. Only according to the verdicts of the tribunals and the Special Conference, 930 people were shot. About 6 thousand more prisoners were shot at the beginning of the war during the evacuation of prisons in Western Ukraine and more than 600 people in Western Belarus.
In December 1939, a robbery was carried out currency reform. Zlotys on household accounts and deposits were exchanged for rubles at the rate of 1:1, but for an amount not exceeding 300 zlotys.
The behavior of many representatives of the new government did not arouse sympathy among the population. Thus, as noted in party documents, in the Drohobych region, “the head of the RO NKVD of the Novostreletsky district, Kochetov, on November 7, 1940, got drunk, in a village club in the presence of the head of the RO police Psekh, severely beat the farm laborer Tsaritsa with a revolver, who was taken to the hospital in a difficult situation.” . In the Bogorodchansky district of the Stanislav region, the communist Syrovatsky “summoned peasants on the issue of tax at night, threatened them, forced girls to cohabitate.” In the Obertynsky district of the same region, “there were massive violations of revolutionary legality.”
In a letter addressed to Stalin, assistant to the Rivne regional prosecutor Sergeev noted: “It would seem that with the liberation of Western Ukraine, the best forces of the country, crystalline honest and unshakable Bolsheviks, should have been sent here to work, but it turned out the other way around. Most of them were crooks big and small, whom they tried to get rid of in their homeland.”
Soviet personnel who replaced the Polish administration were often unable to organize the economy. One of the delegates to the Volyn regional party conference in April 1940 was indignant: “Why, under the Poles, the streets were watered every day, swept with brooms, but now there is nothing?”
In 1939–1940, about 280 thousand Poles were deported from the western regions of Ukraine and Belarus to the eastern regions of the USSR, including 78 thousand refugees from German-occupied areas of Poland. About 6 thousand people died on the way. In June 1941, just before the start of the Great Patriotic War, 11 thousand “Ukrainian nationalists and counter-revolutionaries” were also deported from Western Ukraine. With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, many natives of the western regions of Ukraine and Belarus deserted the Red Army or evaded mobilization.
The question of international legal recognition Soviet annexation Western Ukraine and Western Belarus was finally resolved by the Treaty on Soviet-Polish state border, which the USSR concluded on August 16, 1945 with the pro-communist government of Poland. The Soviet-Polish border passed mainly along the Curzon line, but with the return of the cities of Bialystok and Przemysl (Przemysl) to Poland.
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From the book History of Ukraine author Team of authorsChapter 4. The fate of Western Ukraine
The territory of the USSR was truly huge. Despite the impressive scale of Soviet possessions, in 1939 the current leadership of the country sent forces to annex the regions of Western Ukraine, some of which, after the complete German defeat, were part of Poland.
First of all, Stalin was interested in these territories as new possessions of a powerful power. No less important factor for him there was also security from the western borders.
Taking advantage of the favorable moment after the defeat by the Germans, the Red Army occupied part of Eastern Poland, as well as almost the entire territory of Galicia. Special difficulties there was none, since after the defeat the Polish troops did not particularly try to defend themselves, retreating to the Romanian or Hungarian borders. Therefore, there were practically no serious battles. On the part of the Soviet government, all actions related to the occupation of the lands of Western Ukraine were interpreted as a “sacred duty” to help the fraternal peoples who inhabited Poland at that time. Although the entry into Poland Soviet force was not entirely accepted. There was both warm support and complete hostility among the local population.
A mass exodus was noted among Polish officers and government officials. Not wanting to put up with the “occupation” policy, they fled to the West. But the bulk of the population hoped for support from the Soviet government, so many residents of defeated Poland took a wait-and-see attitude. Especially during that period, Soviet troops supported socially vulnerable sections of the population. And the USSR took every action to “beautifully” present its rise to power. Loud slogans about social justice brought results, making it possible to easily adjust local residents to their ideological way. But, according to modern historians, the Soviet government did not take into account that at that time Western Ukraine was a completely alien region for the USSR in terms of social and ideological aspects.
The role of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in the annexation of Western Ukrainian lands
Many historians today decisive role in the distribution of lands in Western Ukraine are allocated to the Germans. Thus, after the conclusion of the Pact, the Ukrainian lands, which were part of Poland, safely became part of the mighty Soviet power in the fall of 1939. Already on September 28, the agreement concluded between Germany and the USSR completely erased Polish lands from the map.
In addition to non-aggression obligations between the USSR and Germany, the pact included a separate protocol, which clearly stated territorial structure states According to the agreement, most of the lands that were part of Poland were to become part of the Soviet Union. Then, having annexed the territory, the Soviet Union significantly expanded its territorial borders in westward by 250 – 350 km, respectively, increasing the population in western regions Ukraine, which were later assigned to the Soviet Union. Today, these territories are already part of Belarus and Ukraine.