Afternoon on August 19, Port of Dieppe. German infantryman examines the results of his work.
« Second front"How much in this sound, for the heart of the boltseviscishene ... or about one" special operation»August 19, 1942.
It is worth talking about " Second front"In World War II, as any Soviet citizen will tell you, it was opened too late, in 1944, when the fate of the Reich was already clearly decided. But did Sralin or other Soviet leaders not try to force " allies»Open the Second Front a little earlier, when the fate of the war had not yet been decided? They tried, and in the 42nd year. What did you do " allies"In response to Sralin's justly panicky demand to open immediately" Second front"And somehow weaken the monstrous pressure of the Reich in the East?
Arranged for a landing at Dieppe, August 19, 1942.
British military equipment destroyed by the Germans during the landing.
Only 6,000 people landed, they were opposed by only 1,500 Germans. The task of the Anglo-Canadians was to probe the soil, land an assault force, destroy everything in the coastal strip, and then leave before the arrival of the main units of the German army, demonstrating that a large-scale landing operation is possible. It goes without saying that “ allies"Did everything to screw up the landing - no one smiled to land in Europe in 1942, meeting the best units of the Wehrmacht.
Therefore, the first thing the British leaked to the Germans was the date of the landing. A day later - initially the landing was planned for August 18, the Germans were informed about August 19. Then an invisible force in the British General Staff did everything in its power to delay the preparations and so that the landing began on the 19th. Then the British made up the bulk of the landing - 5,000 people - of inexperienced Canadian conscripts (no pity for Canadians!), Who had no combat experience, especially for such complex operations. It is characteristic that the 1000 British commandos accompanying the Canadians were also unable to fulfill their combat missions, while the poor colonial infantry were shot like chickens. But that's not all! If the British undertook to ruin some business, then they cannot do without their trademark English humor. On August 17, the notorious newspaper The Daily Telegraph published a crossword puzzle in which “ french port, five letters". Answer? Of course, Dieppe!
German soldiers and commanders are happy to pose on British tanks.
Finally, on the day of the landing, the English squadron accidentally (by chance?) Bumped into a German convoy, a firefight began, and all the pitiful scraps of surprise were lost. When the British landing craft reached the beaches, all the Germans were at their combat posts, dressed, clean-shaven, having a hearty breakfast and humming "... And now we will fight, fight for 7 days in a row. But we don't fight one at a time, just all together».
The first wave of those who landed, the Germans simply demolished with machine-gun and mortar fire. The few survivors claimed to have seen the training marks on which the Germans learned how to fire mortar shortly before landing. The second wave was also demolished. Only 6 tanks were able to overcome the beaches, which, entangled without infantry on the streets of Dieppe, were abandoned by their crews. Of the 5,000 Canadians who landed, 68% were killed, wounded, or captured. The landed units simply ceased to exist. Could not fulfill their combat missions and 1000 hard-core " commando". And they lost more than 200 people that day, essentially acting as cannon fodder. On top of that, the RAF lost the aerial battle to the Luftwaffe, and the pitiful remnants of the landing force were ripping apart German aircraft. 4 hours after the start of the landing, the BBC officially announced it on its French broadcast, advising the French to evacuate. " We are landing a little here at your side. P.S. Don't tell the Germans»!
Then, however, the BBC fell silent - and the initial information about the losses even the English press had to draw from German reports. Turning the Anglo-Saxon landing into something unimaginable. All this was broadcast on the Eastern Front and, undoubtedly, reached Sralin, as if hinting that he should hold the Wehrmacht alone.
Of the 5,000 Canadians, 3,367 were killed, wounded, or taken prisoner. Of the 1,000 English commandos, 247 are. 1 British destroyer and 33 landing ships were destroyed, the fleet lost 550 killed and wounded. Plus 108 aircraft were lost (while the Luftwaffe lost 18 aircraft). The Germans, fighting off this parody of the attack, lost only 591 people, everywhere (even in the work sector " commando") Keeping the coastal defense line under its control. Worse, the silence of the English media turned the already monstrous landing into an absolute PR disaster. Goebbels spent another month enthusiastically sucking on Dieppe's events. Hitler for showing when repelling the landing “ calmness and patience»Gave the city of Dieppe 10 million francs and released 1,500 French prisoners of war home. And so they said to the crazy French, and they did not laugh: “ Werden Sie zum Hitler hören, - Sie essen Süßigkeiten"! Translated into Russian, these words will sound something like this: “ If you listen to Hitler, you will eat candy»!
Opening question« Second front» was successfully closed for another 2 years.
And today " french port of five letters»It is no longer accepted to remember.
According to the recollections of his contemporaries, after the winter successes of 1941-1942 near Moscow, Tikhvin and Rostov, Stalin was in a state of euphoria. It was the frivolity of Stalin, who overestimated the capabilities of the Red Army and underestimated the Wehrmacht, that became, according to the established opinion, the cause of the catastrophe near Kharkov, in the Crimea and the exit of the Germans to Stalingrad and the Caucasus.
In order to understand this issue, it is necessary to abstract from today's knowledge of the situation and take the place of Stalin and our military leadership. Indeed, the events of the winter of 1941, when the Germans were retreating, often without resistance, created the illusion of a moral breakdown of the enemy in Stalin. At the same time, Stalin was well aware that with the beginning of spring, the enemy could resume the offensive and seize the strategic initiative.
Stalin correctly assessed the growth of Germany's military-industrial potential, its transfer to the conditions of a protracted war, the appointment of Speer as the head of war production, the mobilization of European resources, the massive use of slave labor, labor of prisoners of war.
Therefore, according to Stalin, it was necessary not to give the Germans a respite and to continue the offensive. Then the concept of "mass offensive" was born in our Headquarters, which implied simultaneous active actions in all strategic directions.
In 1942, the USSR produced 25 thousand aircraft, 24 thousand tanks, 57 thousand guns. The USSR put its industry and administration on a war footing and was ready for a protracted and difficult war. In Germany, despite all efforts, such a total mobilization of society did not work out. Firstly, the German workers resolutely did not want to lose the material wealth acquired under the Nazis, and did not perform any feat in the rear, and secondly, the Nazis had to fill many jobs with forced or semi-bonded workers from captured countries or prisoners of war, whose labor productivity was short.
In Germany, there could be no question of putting millions of women and adolescents to the machines, so that they would work fourteen hours or more for food ration cards, live in dugouts and barracks, and even give their savings to the defense fund.
It was a deliberate feat of our people - that is why they were strong. When, during the war, Stalin ordered the Nudelman's cannon to be urgently put into production, this designer and his assistants lived for several weeks in a shooting range, where an experimental shooting of a 37-millimeter cannon took place. The engineers' buns stood three meters from the machine tool, shell casings were falling on the sleeping people in turn. Nevertheless, they later unanimously assured that those weeks in the shooting gallery were the brightest, most joyful time in their lives.
Today they are trying to assure us that a person can get satisfaction only by consuming material goods, overeating and idle, and this example shows how a person can be happy with difficulties if they were overcome on the way to a great goal, filled with the consciousness of the need for their work.
Nevertheless, in planning the 1942 campaign, Stalin, Headquarters and the General Staff first of all tried to predict the enemy's intentions for the summer of 1942.
This analysis was carried out in an extremely shortage of reliable intelligence data, which was associated with the still weak development of the partisan movement in the occupied regions, the lack of experience in strategic analysis in our military intelligence, and Germany's skillful actions to disguise its intentions.
And here it is not necessary to think that only our generals and Stalin were such mugs that the Germans skillfully masked all their intentions from them. During World War II, in all its theaters, the side that possessed the strategic initiative easily misled the enemy, creating the illusion of preparing a strike in the wrong direction. Recall Pearl Harbor, the Battle of Midway Atoll, the Normandy landings, the capture of Crete, the defeat of France. Our army also arranged a lot of similar surprises for the Germans, we will talk about them ahead.
The increased maneuverability of troops, the capabilities of railways, and the availability of aviation made it possible in a day or two to transfer forces from one strategic direction to another and completely unexpectedly deliver a devastating blow to the enemy. A similar situation developed near Kharkov in 1942. Both Stalin and our generals perfectly understood the importance of Kharkov, Stalingrad and the Caucasus for the country and the fate of the front. However, based on the available data, an analysis of the location of the German troops, the main attack was not expected there.
If we look for those guilty of such an assessment, then they are B.M. Shaposhnikov and the General Staff, which through their intelligence and analytical agencies were unable to identify the concentration of Paulus and Kleist's groups of forces in the Kharkov and Kramatorsk region, did not reveal the German disguise of the Blau plan, did not establish the number of troops from Germany, Italy, Hungary, Romania, transferred from Europe. The General Staff also made a mistake in determining the losses of the Wehrmacht in 1941 and misjudged its forces on the Eastern Front as a whole.
Another thing is that there was apparently no alternative to the chosen course of action. The problem was that the Germans still outnumbered the Red Army both qualitatively and quantitatively. This superiority manifested itself in the Crimea, where Manstein's small corps utterly defeated our Crimean Front, and near Moscow, where the 33rd Army of General M.G. was surrounded and destroyed in the Vyazma region. Efremova, 1st Guards Cavalry Corps and 4th Airborne Corps near Leningrad, where all attempts to break through the blockade ring failed. These failures are not the result of someone's mistake, guilt or ill will, but only the superiority of the German army over ours, which remained in 1942.
Therefore, it is not decisive whether or not Tymoshenko's troops were struck on Kharkiv, Operation Blau — the attack on the Caucasus would have taken place in any case. Even a year later, near Kursk, knowing exactly where to expect Manstein's strike, our troops could hardly stop it with two tank armies and so many anti-tank weapons, which in 1942 did not exist physically. And the troops, the commanders in the 43rd were different.
It is doubtful that the Headquarters, having abandoned strikes near Kharkov, in the Crimea and near Leningrad and concentrating all forces, say, near Moscow, would have defeated Army Group Center in the summer of 1942. The Headquarters also required a decision regarding the release of Sevastopol, for which there were all the prerequisites. Tymoshenko's strike near Kharkov could, together with success in the Crimea, result in a strategic offensive of the Red Army in Ukraine.
What Stalin is really to blame in this situation is that he appointed Zhukov as his deputy after the catastrophe in the South, and not before it. While on the Western Front, Zhukov could not understand in detail the situation near Kharkov, visit the troops and assess the real situation. It must be admitted that Stalin also at this moment overestimated to some extent his personal leadership abilities.
The theorizing of some modern researchers about the mistakes of the Soviet command, the belated recommendations on the leadership of the troops are simply not serious. Do not forget that at the head of our armies were Zhukov, Rokossovsky, Shaposhnikov, Vasilevsky, whose qualifications there is no doubt. They made a decision on the basis of the information available and adequate to the conditions that were at that time, to the state of the Red Army with which they had to deal.
Original taken from russdem in post
May 31, 1942, 75 years ago, a football match was held at the Dynamo stadium in besieged Leningrad
The siege of Leningrad is an unprecedented example of tragedy and triumph in the history of mankind, of the highest heroism and fortitude, will to live and the ability to find the means and strength to survive in inhuman conditions.
During the blockade, over 640,000 people died of starvation in Leningrad alone, and more than 17,000 people died from bombs and shells.
In April 1942 German planes scattered leaflets over our units: “Leningrad is the city of the dead. We do not take it yet, because we are afraid of a cadaveric epidemic. We have wiped this city off the face of the earth. "
But Leningrad was not the city of the dead... Leningrad withstood a terrible, cold and hungry winter. Despite the fierce bombing and shelling, since February 1942, the second railway line, "The Road of Life", has been operating without interruption, which has made it possible to increase the supply of bread and other products.
It was decided to gather 2 football teams and hold a match. Let the Nazis know how "the dead play football." The match took place at the Dynamo stadium on May 31, 1942.
At 14 o'clock, the referee entered the field, on whose whistle 2 Leningrad teams appeared - "Dynamo" and Leningrad Metal Plant (LMZ)... Applause was heard in the stands. Two shorter halves (30 minutes each) were played without interruption. How the exhausted and exhausted players were able to spend so much time on the field dug by the explosions - it is not known, it was a feat. The spectators encouraged the players as best they could. The meeting ended with a score of 7: 3 in favor of Dynamo.
And after the match, the players left the field in an embrace, so it was easier to walk... The next day, powerful loudspeakers were installed in a number of areas of the forward positions. Near the front line, for 90 minutes, a report about a football match from the Dynamo stadium was broadcast under the roar of exploding shells.
History of Disastrous Military Intelligence Failures Hughes-Wilson John
6. BOLTLESS OPERATION. Dieppe (1942)
6. BOLTLESS OPERATION. Dieppe (1942)
On August 19, 1942, the forces of the 2nd Canadian Division, based in Sussex, England, landed at Dieppe, a small port city on the northern coast of France. The landing was made just after sunrise with the participation of 30 new heavy infantry support tanks "Churchill". Five hours later, the defeated members of the raid retreated, suffering heavy losses: out of 5,000 people who were part of the landing, 2,700 were killed, wounded or taken prisoner. Since only 4,000 fighters landed on the coast, this meant 60% losses, which exceeds the saddest "record" at that time, achieved on the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The Germans were amazed at the stupidity and recklessness of their opponents. One German commentator wrote: "This adventure contradicted all the rules of military strategy and logic." The Dieppe operation was overgrown with numerous myths and secrets.
For a number of Canadian nationalists, Dieppe has become one of the key myths, according to which the brave Canadian soldiers were sent to certain death by cruel and incompetent British generals. In the eyes of the British public, this was a sacrificial political gesture aimed at convincing Stalin that the British Empire was indeed trying to take some of the burden off the USSR by opening a second front; conspiracy theorists regard Dieppe as nothing less than an insidious British conspiracy, the purpose of which was to prove to American strategists in Washington, who in 1942 did not understand anything about European wars and demanded decisive action against the Nazis, that any premature offensive across the English Channel would inevitably end bloody defeat.
Each of these interpretations contains a grain of truth - but none is exhaustive. For in one very important respect, Dieppe is unique: it was the only major offensive operation undertaken by the Imperial military without the official sanction of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This was the only major operational decision by the Allies in the entire Second World War that was not documented. This is the secret that gave rise to all the myths about Dieppe.
A careful analysis of the evidence gives every reason to believe that the Dieppe operation carried informal character and was carried out without the consent of the relevant authorities. The assault on Dieppe was undertaken without adequate resources, lack of intelligence on many key aspects of the German defense, and, finally, he did not have the full support of the British command, which was often kept in the dark or simply ignored. Even worse, the developers of the operation did not fundamentally warn the official intelligence agencies about the impending landing and did not demand the necessary intelligence information from them. As a result, intelligence turned out to be the weakest point of the operation.
It may seem strange that a certain military leader ventured without an official order to storm the "fortress Europe" occupied by the Wehrmacht, but the personality, ambition, and track record of the person responsible for the Dieppe operation, Lord Mountbatten, were strange. In late 1941, Captain Lord Mount Betten was reassigned from command of a Royal Navy ship and appointed Chief of Joint Operations under Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of the General Staff. By March 1942, Mountbatten was promoted at once by three ranks, becoming the youngest vice admiral in the history of the British navy.
Mountbatten had three main points of pride. He proved to be a brave destroyer captain - his last three ships were incapacitated under circumstances that, according to his many critics, testified only to his recklessness and inexperience. Secondly, he was a specialist in self-promotion, presenting himself as a young and daring hero, capable of repelling the Germans and brightening up the bitterness of defeat for the British. Finally, Mountbatten had huge connections. A cousin of the King, a confidant of the Prime Minister, a personal friend of Noel Coward, able to easily enlist the support of both Hollywood friends and the British establishment, Mountbatten was a bright spot in the bleak military landscape of British life in early 1942. There was even talk among conservative politicians (almost certainly initiated by Mountbatten himself) that he should have been given powers that would elevate him over the other officers of the General Staff.
Behind the carefully cultivated legend of Mountbat Shadow was the unscrupulousness and ambition that often accompany great men and their success. He did not hesitate to deceive during naval exercises in order to distinguish himself from other officers, and deliberately withheld or falsified military documents after the war when he felt that his carefully cultivated historical image was in danger. Even his official the biographer saw fit to mention that Ma-unbatten was inclined to "rewrite history with an arrogant indifference to facts."
Mountbatten's vanity knew no bounds. In the midst of hostilities, he could be seen posing for the camera on the set of Where We Serve, a hagiographic propaganda piece based on his personal experience, in which his close friend Noel Coward played the dashing destroyer captain. Here is what Mountbatten wrote to Coward in this connection after the Dieppe raid: "Your letter caught me on my busiest day ... but since the case ... is urgent, I will first solve it, and then take up my official duties." A normal commander in his place would visit the wounded and dying and listen to the reports of the survivors.
Beaverbrook himself, knowing that Mountbatten does not tolerate any attacks on his own reputation, carefully created by himself, warned during the war: "Do not trust Mountbatten with any positions of responsibility." Despite Beaverbrook's warning, the young, unprincipled, vain, and ambitious aristocrat gained a seat on the country's highest military council, as well as the resources and power to attack the German-occupied coast of Europe. Mountbatten's character, combined with newfound power and ambition, led to tragic consequences.
The 1942 Dieppe raid had a historical predecessor: the 1918 St George's Day raid on Zeebrugge. Under the command of Admiral Roger Keyes of the Dover Patrol, a sabotage group of warships, marines and soldiers stormed the hangars of German submarines on the Belgian coast in a desperate attempt to prevent boats from the Kaiser's fleet out to sea. The raid was partly successful and, despite heavy losses, raised the British morale, shattered by the last German ground offensive in World War I. The Zeebrugge raid was touted as an example of a brilliant military operation that caused serious damage to the enemy at the cost of little blood - this kind of indirect attack has been the favorite technique of British strategists for many years.
In 1940, Keyes reappeared on the arena of hostilities, this time as Chief of Staff for Joint Operations, tasked with attacking the victorious Germans on the shores of Europe and repeating his 1918 success. It is difficult to say what exactly pushed the British to attack the defended positions on the European coast - the Germans never felt the need to undertake such a military adventure on the British coast. Be that as it may, in 1940 the new Prime Minister Churchill decided that, despite the expulsion of British troops from the continent, it was necessary to continue the offensive strategy - not only with the aim of inflicting damage on the Germans, but also to cheer up the suffering population of occupied Europe, who in 1941 there was no other hope of liberation. Apart from aerial bombardments, the offensive was the only chance.
The combined operations headquarters was an unusual structure. It was an experimental headquarters for the coordination and planning of combat operations, created to combine the resources of the three branches of the armed forces. When in 1941 Mountbatten was replaced by Keyes on the direct orders of Winston Churchill, his task, in Mountbatten's own words, was “to continue the raids so brilliantly begun by Niz to maintain the offensive spirit ... Second, to prepare for the invasion to Europe, without which we will never win this war. " In addition, according to Mountbatten, Churchill said: "I want you to turn the southern coast of England from a defensive bastion into a springboard for attack."
It was a head-spinning take-off for the recent 41-year-old ship captain, whose pinnacle of dreams was commanding one of the Royal Navy's new aircraft carriers. But Churchill, in his choice and appointment to the high office of the reckless Mountbatten, was guided primarily by political considerations: the Prime Minister wanted to demonstrate to the Americans, who had just entered the war and were skeptical of the combat potential of their ally, the offensive spirit of the British troops. After the defeats in Norway, France, near Dunkirk, Greece, Crete, Malaya and Singapore, after Rommel's victories in North Africa culminating in the surrender of Tobruk in June 1942, the Americans had every reason to assess the combat effectiveness of the British army low. Even Churchill could not understand why surrender follows surrender, often repeating bitterly: "Why don't our soldiers want to fight?"
Churchill made a good choice. Realizing the charm of Mountbatten, his good looks, remembering the impression desperate grunt what he produced for the Roosevelts, especially Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt, the cunning prime minister understood that if anyone could convince high-ranking American politicians of the fortress of the British morale, it was Mountbatten. During his visits to Washington, the new Combined Operations Commander won the hearts of every American he met, including the living personification of Republican military prowess and America's greatest soldier, General George W. Marshall, who became his personal friend. The young hero did a tremendous job in the field of diplomatic PR, this time using his brilliant abilities not only for his own benefit, but also in the interests of his compatriots. Churchill was justly proud of his protégé. Mountbatten himself seemed to be well aware of Churchill's true intentions, boasting to one of his friends: "Winston told me what he wants, and now I must put his plans into practice." With such powerful support, even the most humble person would find it difficult not to acquire megalomania, and Mountbatten never suffered from excessive modesty. According to the Canadian historian and specialist in Dieppe, Professor Brian Loring Willa, "if Mountbatten's head dizzy, then Churchill was most to blame." You can even view Mountbatten as sacrifice the indiscriminate Churchill, who played on the weaknesses of the young admiral for his own purposes.
After Kees left, Mountbatten wasted no time in establishing his own order at the Joint Operations Headquarters and at the same time reaping the benefits of his predecessor's successes. The headquarters was bathed in glory thanks to successful raids on the Norwegian islands of Vogsøy and the first combat distinction of the Parachute Regiment - the daring kidnapping of a German radar installation from the city of Brunewal in northern France. Even the raid on Saint-Nazaire on March 27, 1942, despite the losses, was considered successful (five recipients of the Victoria Cross), since during it a huge dry dock was destroyed (the only one capable of servicing German warships in the Atlantic), which decided one of the great strategic problems for the British. All these operations were developed by the headquarters at the time when Keyes was in charge.
New plans by Mountbatten's Joint Operations Headquarters for 1942 included a vast array of attacks, from the temporary capture of Alderney, one of the Channel Islands in the English Channel, to a reckless raid on the Gestapo headquarters in Paris. The crown number was supposed to be the raid on Dieppe in June, codenamed "Lautia" (Rutter). The objectives of the Dieppe operation, despite later claims that it was an unsuccessful attempt at a large-scale invasion of Europe or some kind of deceitful maneuver to disorient the Germans and support the French Resistance fighters, were in fact the following: to check whether it was possible to capture and hold a major port in for a limited period of time; obtain intelligence from prisoners, as well as seize documents and equipment; to assess the reaction of the Germans to a major "false" attack on the French coast.
In addition to these purely military objectives, three others, less clearly defined, were set. First, the Air Force headquarters wanted to engage the Luftwaffe in the West in a large-scale air battle and inflict serious damage on the German air force based in France; a second, purely political goal: to demonstrate to the USSR that Britain is determined to take the Germans by the throat; the third, and the most obscure of all: the desire of the Canadian government to become more involved in the war.
The first of them later played into the hands of Mount Betgen. Although the Royal Navy and the Army were wary of providing too much force for Operation Launch, Air Force Chief of Staff Marshal Portal was keenly interested in demonstrating the power of a rapidly expanding fleet of fighters in 1942 and engaging the German Air Force in the hopes of inflicting a crushing defeat on the Germans. ... Actions to destroy ground targets in a port located close to airfields in southern England were supposed to "provoke a response from the Luftwaffe." As a result, the British Air Force became staunch supporters of the plan, while the other two branches of the military reacted rather coolly to it.
Churchill's political difficulties in the spring and summer of 1942 were largely associated with his support for Operation Lotsiya in particular and the activities of the Joint Operations Headquarters in general. Any British victory in the West would be an important trump card in the complex political game between the Allies. The need for decisive action became even more obvious after Stalin's speech in February 1942, in which he dropped an indirect allusion to the possibility of concluding a separate peace with Hitler. From the point of view of the seriously alarmed British Foreign Office, this speech could be either the first step towards a truce, or an attempt to shift a significant part of the burden of the war onto the shoulders of the British in order to lighten the burden of the Russians. In any case, it was necessary to convince the USSR that Great Britain was determined to fight. Large-scale offensive actions in the West would confirm this determination, regardless of their outcome.
Summer began under the sign of unfortunate defeats in the desert and British dissatisfaction with the actions of their prime minister. Churchill became increasingly depressed and desperate for success - any success. With the fall of Tobruk on June 21, 1942, the political volcano in Westminster and Whitehall threw up a lava of discontent with Churchill's leadership in wartime, with the Prime Minister and his government receiving fierce criticism in political circles and the press. A vote of no confidence was voted in the House of Commons, and although its outcome (clearly orchestrated) was in favor of Churchill (475 votes to 25), the Prime Minister experienced a tremendous shock. He later admitted that "the only thing he always feared was the House of Commons in the midst of a debate."
To survive as a politician, Churchill needed military success. And he knew it. Now he had to wage a political struggle not only with the Germans and his strategic allies Roosevelt and Stalin, but also with the skeptical parliament and Whitehall. The cautious and pragmatic chiefs of staff considered most of his military adventures premature, content with a gradual build-up of British military power. The politician Churchill, who understood perfectly well that in a democracy, the crowd should be appeased, needed some kind of momentary success. Only bomber aircraft led by the cocky Harris and the Joint Operations Headquarters led by the desperate Lord Louis Mountbatten shared his values \u200b\u200band were ready to face off against the enemy in the summer of 1942.
The third target of Operation Launch was the least practical of all. It consisted in the desire of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, after two and a half years of inactivity, to take part in the battles. From the start of the war, Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King has publicly expressed strong support for Canada's entry into the war, but has been slow to send its troops to the front. Given the aggressiveness and traditionally high morale of Canadians, such a policy was inevitably doomed to failure. Despite the fact that thousands of Canadians signed up to volunteer, Mackenzie King realized that conscription into the army to serve overseas would lead to political problems, especially in French-speaking Canada, and did everything to minimize Canada's participation in the fighting on the front lines.
Divisions intensified among politicians in Ottawa. Having created a large, well-trained and equipped army and sent it to the English county of Sussex to prepare for battle, Canadian politicians found that their war machine began to work on its own. The commanders of the Canadian Expeditionary Force in England, McNaughton, Creerar and Roberts, tired of two years of inaction, looked for an opportunity to take a more active part in the war, if only to give their bored soldiers something to do. As usual, boredom manifested itself in a fall in discipline. Canadians stole, got drunk, fought and engaged in promiscuous sex, which is quite natural for any large group of healthy young people who find themselves far from home and do not know what to do, but surrounded by many available single women.
The Canadian propaganda machine tried in vain to reassure the public that the crime rate in the Canadian army was no higher than in others. By August 1942, 3,238 Canadian soldiers in Sussex had been tribunalized, and the locals fed up with their antics hoped the fighting would soon turn the attention of their overly perky guests to other things. Lord Woof-Woof scoffed from Berlin: “If you want to occupy Berlin, give every Canadian soldier a motorcycle and a bottle of whiskey. Then declare Berlin closed to the public. Canadian soldiers will be there in 48 hours and the war will be over. " In 1942, the Canadian army in Great Britain was the most trained, but the least of all fighting. The Canadians and their commanders were eager to fight. When Lieutenant General Harry Crerar, commander of the 1st Canadian Corps, was summoned to the headquarters of Montgomery, Chief of Southeast Command, on April 27, 1942, he was asked if Canadian soldiers were ready to take part in a major raid on the French coast. The answer was short: "You bet!"
On May 13, 1942, the Chiefs of Staff approved the plan for Operation Lotsiya. The plan envisaged a frontal offensive along the entire coast of Dieppe, supported by flanking attacks by commandos in order to destroy the coastal batteries that covered the approaches to the port. Thousands of sorties were planned to take control of the airspace and ensure complete air superiority. The navy was supposed to shell the city from the coastal zone. The Lotsiya plan was not successful. In the last stages of planning, the attacking forces had to be significantly reduced, since the fleet refused to provide battleships and other large vessels for fire support, and the Air Force, in order to avoid losses among French civilians, reduced plans for an intensive bombardment of the Dieppe coastline to a series of fighter-bomber raids and attacks from low level flight. The 2nd Canadian Division was to lead the offensive and temporarily capture the radar station and airfield in the city of Ark, five kilometers from the coast.
On July 5 and 6, Canadian forces boarded the landing craft, but the weather began to turn bad and they were ordered to remain at anchor. While the soldiers were seasick in the cramped landing barges, two German bombers appeared in the skies over the Isle of Wight and bombarded the flotilla without significant results. The strong wind over the English Channel did not abate, and on July 7 the operation was canceled, and the soldiers landed on the beach, flooding the pubs and streets of the cities of southern England, where they talked about the failed raid and the horrors they experienced in the cramped landing barges during the storm. Everyone believed that the Dieppe operation had failed and now would never take place.
It looked like the truth. Neither the commander of the army, Montgomery, nor the commander of the fleet at Portsmouth, Sir William James, believed in the feasibility of the plan. The further the development of Operation Lotsiya progressed, the more their fears became. Montgomery, as commander of the army, did not like the very idea of \u200b\u200ba frontal offensive by infantry without proper bombardment by air force planes in order to weaken the enemy, and the head of bomber aviation was not ready to conduct such an operation. Bernard Lowe Montgomery participated in the First World War and understood perfectly well that a poorly prepared frontal offensive without proper fire support was doomed to failure.
In turn, the commander of the Royal Navy in Portsmouth and the admiral, who was at the head of the amphibious forces, well remembered the fate of the British Navy ships Prince of Wales and Ripalo, sunk six months ago in Malaya. They were not going to risk their battleships by allowing them to come more than five miles to the enemy-occupied coast, where they could easily be bombed by the German air force. First Sea Lord Admiral Sir Dudley Pound was in complete agreement with them. The professional military realized that the Dieppe raid was poorly thought out, lacked adequate fire support, and was not coordinated. Now that the operation had failed, they all breathed a sigh of relief.
What followed the cancellation of Operation Lautia was the beginning of the Dieppe mystery. The cancellation of a long-cherished plan has drawn public attention to its developers. Taking on the fire of criticism both for the overly inflated structure of the Joint Operations Headquarters, and for the "slapdash" planning of Operation Lotsiya, Mountbatten decided to act independently: on July 8 and 11 he held meetings of the main headquarters that participated in the planning of the initial operation, and turned to them for support in organizing a new raid. However, he was refused.
During the second meeting, on July 11, Mountbatten quietly asked several of his supporters to stay after the main critics of his plan (such as Rear Admiral Bailey-Grohmann, who had been appointed commander of the fleet for Operation Launch) left the premises. No one knows exactly what happened at the closed meeting that followed, but after it Mountbatten and his senior staff officer, Navy Captain John Hughes-Hallett, immediately set about designing a new operation to replace Lautia. It will be called "Jubilee", and Dieppe will again become its target.
Any major operation involving an attack on the European continent required the approval of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. July saw one of the most curious episodes in the history of World War II: the Chief of Staff for Joint Operations, a protégé of the Prime Minister and media darling Lord Louis Mountbatten set out to fool the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the apparatus that coordinated the activities of intelligence services in charge of armed forces and most of the officers of their own headquarters. Mountbatten decided to launch a new attack on Dieppe under a different name and without official approval from his superiors. In his declining years in a little-known television interview Air force In 1972, he noted: "I made an unusual and, I think, very bold decision - to try again to storm Dieppe."
Even Captain Hughes-Hallett, the closest officer to Mountbatten and a staunch supporter of his plan for a new attack on Dieppe, was troubled by the lack of approval from above. He emphasized that, as a senior officer of the Joint Operations Headquarters, he would need to refer to the instructions of some official authority in all staff documents and written requests. In this regard, on July 17, the Chief of Staff of Joint Operations sent an official request to the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the adoption of the following resolution: "The Chief of Staff of Joint Operations is instructed to organize a new urgent operation to replace the Lotsi ... using the same troops." The chiefs of staff doubted, and the resolution was not included in the minutes of the meeting.
Mountbatten grew impatient. On July 25 and 26, he sent new requests to the Chiefs of Staff Committee, this time asking for unrestricted authority to conduct large-scale raids without the need to specify offensive targets each time. Jealous of Mount Betten's rapid rise and privileged access to the top, extremely suspicious of his ambitions and motives, the chiefs of staff did not go to meet him. On July 27, they passed a resolution that slightly expanded his planning powers, but at the same time emphasized the need to obtain official permission to organize any new operation.
Mountbatten did not expect more. He was glad to have the opportunity to do something, and ordered Captain Hughes-Hallett and several trusted officers of his headquarters to get down to business immediately. It is unknown what he told Hughes-Hallett, but there is little doubt that he deceived him. He may have presented the case in such a way that the July 27 resolution expanding his planning powers actually implied the consent of the chiefs of staff to develop a new plan called Jubilee. Hughes-Hallett was his staunch ally and truly believed in everything his charismatic boss said, who was in close contact with prime ministers, movie stars and chiefs of staff. For a senior staff officer, such an attitude towards his superior was quite natural.
On July 28, for the information of a limited circle of officers of the Joint Operations Headquarters, an order was issued to resume Operation Lotsiya under the leadership of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and codenamed Jubilee. On July 31, the headquarters of the sabotage forces received new operational orders, and all parties involved urgently began planning a second operation. On 12 August, the Chiefs of Staff gave their consent to planninga new raid instead of the canceled Pilot. Dieppe was not mentioned or discussed as the target of the operation.
For the rest of his days, Mountbatten referred to these most generalized decisions to give the impression that his second raid on Dieppe had been officially approved. However, neither the testimonies of his colleagues in the committee of chiefs of staff, nor the documents of the cabinet of ministers say a word in favor of this version. Even Churchill could not remember the decisions concerning the raid on Dieppe when he was working on his own work on the history of the war - the book "The Loop of Fate" - in 1950. In the end, seeing no other way out, he accepted Mountbatten's interpretation and took responsibility for himself, but we know from his correspondence that Churchill did so only because neither he nor anyone else could find any government documents , which would testify to the opposite.
The truth is that there was simply no specific approval of a new attack on Dieppe, and Mountbatten was well aware of this. He solved the problem with the troops, advising the Canadian military leaders to keep the details of the new operation secret "in the interests of security." A limited number of staff officers began planning Operation Jubilee in the strictest secrecy. But not everyone was informed. Under the pretext of "security" (this priceless mantra of the military trying to hide the unpleasant truth), several key departments were deliberately kept in the dark. The recalcitrant Fleet Admiral Bailey Grohmann was not included in the initiates, and Captain Hughes Hallett took over his duties at Mountbatten's request. Bypassing Montgomery's headquarters, Mauntbatten secretly maintained contact directly with the top commanders of the Canadian army. Most dangerous of all, the new plan for the raid on Dieppe was not communicated to either the Chief of Staff of Mountbatten himself, nor the senior intelligence liaison officer, nor his official deputy, Major General Haydon. In the commercial realm, this would be tantamount to having the chairman of the UK branch of the company Ford decided to build a new car model in the UK and would not notify the company's US headquarters, the company's sales and marketing director, or its CFO. It remains to be seen how Mountbatten was going to get out of this situation. Most likely, he relied on the success of the raid, knowing that "the winners are not judged."
The real danger to the resumed operation lay in the area of \u200b\u200bintelligence. Although the measures for the material and technical support of any impending military operation cannot be kept secret for a long time, it is far from always possible to determine by them locationoperations. When it comes to information support, the secret inevitably comes to light: Mountbeth-ten needed maps, plans, photographs and other information about Dieppe. Mountbatten's secret designs were in two dangers: he had to keep his revised operational plan secret, not only from the Germans, but, if possible, from the Chiefs of Staff. The task seemed almost impossible, but Mountbatten badly needed intelligence - a lot of intelligence - to launch a successful offensive on a secure port in occupied Europe.
The British have demonstrated prowess over the years in leading and coordinating intelligence operations at the highest level. Learning from their mistakes and experiences, by the end of 1941 they had perfected the fundamental principle: all operations to notify the Interdepartmental Security Council (Inter-Services Security Board - ISSB). The purpose of such a bureaucratic measure was simple, but extremely important: ISSB was the focal point of actions to mislead the enemy and, in particular, coordinated the activities LCS - the British Secret Service, the activities of which are described in Chapter 2. In addition, ISSB ensured the safety of operations: only in it they knew which of the secrets that were leaked to the Germans during various counterintelligence and diversion operations were genuine, and which were fake, only in it they could assess the overall degree of risk that threatened the security of a particular operation.
Mountbatten chose not to inform the Inter-Agency Security Council about Operation Jubilee. The official work "British Intelligence during the Second World War" does not say a word about this. Moreover, Mountbatten did not seek help from any of the leading intelligence organizations such as the Secret Intelligence Service (SJS), relying on intelligence gathered for Operation Launch. He updated this basic information with a series of low-level reconnaissance missions assigned to tactical aerial photo reconnaissance squads and dedicated small liaison units that could be contacted directly without having to answer awkward questions.
This neglect of intelligence was fraught with serious dangers. First, Mountbatten risked being left without the freshest intelligence after his troops landed. Secondly, he was deprived of the opportunity to find out how the Germans were aware of his plans. Dieppe was by then seriously discredited as a target. Six thousand soldiers have spoken of the Lautia raid across southern England, canceled on 7 July, since the day they disembarked from the landing craft. Who could forbid them? For them, it was already history. Everything connected with the raid on Dieppe has long ceased to be a secret. And to top all the trouble LCS(of which Mountbatten knew almost nothing) was busy transmitting carefully selected bits of information about old raid on Dieppe to his "colleagues" from the German intelligence services. With the cancellation of Lotsiya it was possible to safely supply the enemy with more or less valuable information about this operation in order to increase his confidence in the agents МІ5, embedded in the Abwehr.
German intelligence disinformation operation carried out by the British Double Cross Committee using recruited agents МІ5, in the summer of 1942 bore fruit. The German intelligence service received at least four warnings about the Dieppe raid from their alleged agents in the UK. Thus, the Germans were perfectly informed. To such an extent that some commentators in all seriousness believed that the second Dieppe operation was a fraudulent maneuver, undertaken at the cost of a lot of blood for the sole purpose of strengthening the reputation of the agents МІ5 in the Abwehr. This version is clearly far-fetched. The most likely explanation is that the Interdepartmental Security Council gave permission for the transfer of minor secrets to the Abwehr after the cancellation of the Lotsi. The only problem was that the secrets weren't insignificant: Dieppe did intend to attack, but Mount Betten chose not to inform the Inter-Agency Security Council of the resumption of the operation. Mountbatgen's troops were at great risk.
As is often the case in war, everything was decided by chance - the German intelligence service in Paris did not convey their warnings to the troops defending Dieppe. Although a training alert was issued on the French coast on 17 and 18 August 1942, and Hitler and the commander of German forces in the West, von Rundstedt, warned of possible raids on the French coast, there is no evidence that this was all related to a specific attack in the area. Dieppe. There is no evidence that the Germans received reinforcements and prepared an ambush for the Canadians. But neither Mountbatgen's intelligence nor the Canadians' intelligence knew this. Mountbatten was lucky.
The reconnaissance tasks in preparation for Operation Jubilee were relatively simple. For an attack on a defended coast, the operational headquarters must have four types of information: topography of the battlefield (steepness of the coastal strip, direction of currents, etc.); data on the number and deployment of enemy troops; data on tools, their location and potential; and finally, information about the enemy's plans for retaliatory actions - to fight, wait for reinforcements, or retreat.
In theory, all this seems easy, but obtaining such information requires access to the entire "pantheon" of intelligence sources and agencies. For example, information about the coastal strip can be found in books published before the war, but since time and tides inevitably make their own adjustments, it is important that scout divers carefully recheck the topography of the coast as close as possible to the beginning of the raid. Information about the number, disposition, and morale of the enemy can be collected piece by piece using aerial photographic reconnaissance, agent reports, electronic intelligence and from publicly available sources. It is more difficult to collect information about the guns and ammunition depots of the enemy: after revealing their location by means of aerial photographic reconnaissance, information from local agents or prisoners of war or data from electronic intelligence is required to specify the images obtained. Finally, the plans and intentions of the enemy can only be learned from the messages of agents, captured documents and electronic intelligence data.
The fact is that in order to conduct a successful operation of such a scale as the Dieppe Raid, the entire huge arsenal of information gathering means at the disposal of British intelligence was needed. He was available and could provide answers to any questions, but if Mountbatten turned to the Joint Intelligence Committee for full information support of the raid (Joint Intelligence Committee - JIC) Britain, he would certainly have alerted the Cabinet Office and the Joint Chiefs of Staff of his intention to resume the raid, and they would have stopped him. Therefore, deciding to bypass the Chiefs of Staff Committee, Mountbatten was forced to bypass the intelligence agencies.
Ignoring the intelligence community, Mountbatten risked leaving his troops in the dark about vital information. The fact that he did not use all available sources of intelligence information led to senseless losses. Here are two simple but convincing examples: the coast at Dieppe was too steep and rocky for tanks with lightweight tracks; secondly, artillery pieces were hidden in the coastal grottoes. On the day of the operation, not knowing these two facts would have killed many Canadians. Both problems could easily have been resolved by the Joint Intelligence Committee with the intelligence at its disposal, but Mountbatten did not dare to seek help from an outside superior agency. He wanted to keep his desire for personal glory a secret.
Several other intelligence errors at Dieppe bordered on farce. According to data obtained by the intelligence department of the Joint Operations Headquarters - and by military intelligence - the Dieppe area was defended by the 110th Wehrmacht Division. Of course, the soldiers of the 110th division would have been glad to be there, but that was impossible: in those days they wearily wandered across Russia almost four thousand kilometers from the scene, pursuing Soviet soldiers retreating to the east in the endless steppe.
In fact, the military unit, enjoying delicious wine and French girls in Dieppe, was the 571st Infantry Regiment of the 302nd Division, a second category division composed mostly of Poles and middle-aged ethnic Germans and equipped with a variegated mix of horses, motorcycles, trophy Czech and French weapons and other ammunition, which the commissary service at the headquarters of the western group of German forces in Paris was able to beg from Berlin. Lacking weapons, ammunition and trained manpower, the commander of the 302nd Division wisely decided to focus his resources on covering the most likely enemy offensive site: the rocky coast of Dieppe. Equally prudent was his order not to place guns in prepared firing positions, where they could be spotted and attacked from the air. Scouring the coast during tactical reconnaissance flights on the instructions of the Joint Operations Headquarters, pilots would not have been able to look inside the grottoes in the coastal cliffs of Dieppe. The wisdom of Major General Konrad Haase's simple yet effective defensive plan became apparent to the defenders as flanking fire from assorted guns hidden in the grottoes and a captured French tank embedded in the dam began to mow down the Canadians as they climbed the steep rocky slope.
Because Mountbatten neglected the services SIS and agent networks of the Special Operations Directorate (Special Operations Executive - SOE) during France, his headquarters decided to use the services of electronic intelligence - if not at the strategic level (in this case, he would have to deal with the Joint Intelligence Committee), then at least at the tactical level. This measure was supported by the experience gained during the spring raid on Saint-Nazaire. If the operational group of the headquarters could hear how the enemy reacts and what orders the enemy receives directly during the battle, the military commanders of the Joint Operations Headquarters could act "with open eyes." This clever tactic worked considerably better during the raid on Saint-Nazaire than anyone at Chidla (the headquarters of the radio interception service) could have imagined. Ironically, during the Dieppe operation, the air was overwhelmed with information, and the radio interception service of the Joint Operations Headquarters simply did not cope with the timely transmission of data to the aviation commander during the battle. However, the idea itself was reasonable.
As the day of the attack approached, there was growing concern over the success of Operation Jubilee and its secrecy. Secrecy was a major concern; after the cancellation of the first attack, it may have seemed pointless, but several cases of information leaks and loss of documents have heightened the need to keep preparations for the operation secret - at least from the Joint Intelligence Committee. Even the enthusiastic Canadians doubted. The infantry division commander, Major General Roberts, was alarmed by the whole plan, but the cheerful assurances of Mountbatten and the staff of the Joint Operations Headquarters partly reassured him. After all, he reasoned, they were experienced staff officers, not my match. His concern, however, was shared by many Canadians.
Captain Austin Stanton, adjutant of the Calgary Panzer Regiment, admitted: "In my opinion, the operation had no chance." He was so pessimistic that on the day of the operation he dressed in new clothes in case he was taken prisoner, which greatly angered his commander. Be that as it may, on the night of August 18, the Calgary Panzer Regiment embarked on a new 60-meter tank landing ship (TDK) in Newhaven in full view of the silent crowd of civilians. "There was an ominous silence when we queued up at the docks," Stanton recalled. Together with 4,963 other participants in Operation Jubilee, who embarked on 237 ships, the alarmed adjutant of a Canadian tank regiment sailed to meet the battle.
The attack did not go well from the start. The German fleet carried out regular patrols, during which the supervision of commercial maritime shipping along the French coastline was ensured. This fact, including the schedule of patrol convoys, was well known in Dover and Portsmouth, where coastal surface detection radars were located. However, more accurate information about the convoys was kept secret at the request of senior management, as it came from confidential strategic sources such as the Enigma message decryption team. No one from Mountbatgen's intelligence headquarters requested details of German movements in the Channel on 18 and 19 August. To make such a request would be to inform the Joint Intelligence Committee and with it the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the operation.
The result was predictable. In the early morning of 19 August, as ships carrying 3rd battalion commandos approached the cliffs at Belleville and Berneval east of Dieppe, their escort stumbled into a German coastal convoy in the dark. Despite two clear signals sent at 01.27 and 02.44 by Royal Navy radars from England to the commander of the troops aboard the destroyer Culp, with the exact coordinates of the German convoy, the warning did not reach the escort on the eastern flank. The Joint Operations Headquarters plan began to falter from the first steps.
The participants in Operation Jubilee learned about the German convoy only when a shell of light flashed over their heads and in its cold, false light, the German escort opened fire, knocking out gunboat No. 5, which provided direct cover for the landing ships on the eastern flank. As the other Royal Navy escorts approached, a fierce exchange of fire began with tracer shells flying in all directions "like fireworks." As a result, the Germans were forced to retreat with heavy losses. Operation Jubilee has lost its element of surprise. At dawn, the ships of the eastern flank, with the paratroopers on board, who did not have time to recover from the surprise, approached the shore in anxious silence. According to one of the sergeants of the 3rd Commando Battalion, "through binoculars, you could see the damned Germans watching through their binoculars as we land on the beach."
With the first rays of the sun, several attacks began at once. To the east, on the left flank, the 3rd commando battalion, led by the formidable Peter Young (who watched the night skirmish from its very epicenter), overcame the barbed wire barriers, “with which the Hans carefully entangled the entire cliff - probably to make it easier for us rise, "and conducted a successful attack, silenced the Goebbels artillery battery. By noon, Young had returned to New Haven, his field uniform torn to shreds and his hands torn with blood. On the far western flank at Varengeville, the disciplined 4th Commando Battalion, under Lord Lovat, destroyed the guns of the Hess Battery in an exemplary double-sweep maneuver.
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That is why the recent opening of Spartak has become a super event not only for the fans of red and white, but also for millions of their eternal and implacable rivals in pain. "AiF" decided to refresh the memory of the history of the "elder brothers" of the "Spartak" stadium - the oldest and most beloved arenas of the capital.
Mototrek for a mistress!
Few people know that the Dynamo football team already existed in 1923, and there was nowhere for it to train (how many years did Spartak!), Except for the wasteland behind the Riga (in those years - Vindavsky) railway station. At first, it was a grass-free area with three rows of wooden benches, and the showers were located in ... the former morgue (even atheists were baptized when they entered them to wash themselves!).
Dynamo moved to a new "trump" place only when the financial situation in the club improved. The commercial department of the team is headed by young talented lurie economistsand Loevskywho organized artels for the production of sporting goods. Having connected to sewing ... former street children, the club began to make a profit and look for a place for a new arena. After much debate, Petrovsky Park was chosen. Why did they argue for a long time? Because it was the most favorite place for walks of the Moscow nobility. It housed a platform called the "brides' fair": rich "marriageable Muscovites" were brought here "for viewing". There was a restaurant, a theater, even a film studio! That is why the park was protected from the "working masses". But they didn’t save it - the crowd with shovels, picks and boots burst into the “nest of the aristocracy” ...
Alexander Lagman was appointed the chief architect of the project... He designed a gigantic ... bike and motorcycle track around the stadium. What for? For love! The lady of his heart, according to rumors, was a passionate motorcycle racer ... But something went wrong there with the angle of inclination, and it was impossible to accelerate on the Dynamo track. Therefore, on the days of sold-out matches, he was simply forced with additional benches. Fun fact: At that time, the bill was indicated not only on the plates. There were also balloons above the stands. Three reds and two whites meant that the team in red shirts was leading with a score of 3: 2.
The new stadium became a whole "sports complex", it could accommodate up to 50 thousand spectators! Alas, on June 19, 1941, the last "peaceful" game was held there - the owners took over the Stalingrad "Tractor", and then the war began. Eyewitnesses recalled that during the last match, a flock of black crows flew out onto the field and everyone felt creepy ... The stadium turned into a training center for fighters, and in 1942 young spruces were planted right on the field - so the arena was disguised from German pilots ...
On June 3, 1945, the era of the "Moscow football boom" began at Dynamo, when people hungry for spectacles took the capital's stadiums by storm ...
Stands for sorcerers
“Locomotive” (it was built in 1935 under the name “Stalinets”) is the most mystical of all. Why do you think he was allowed to call himself "Stalinist"? After all, the secretary general did not particularly like football. There is a version that this is because the "Stalin's bunker" was located nearby. And then the name justified itself: the son of the "leader of the peoples" Vasily loved football very much and recruited players into his Air Force team at this stadium. How? I looked after the football player and ... took him to his state dacha. And there he kept until he agreed to the transition.
"This stadium was adored by psychics, - told" AiF " esotericist Mikhail Lamanov... - The stands were there for a long time in the form of ... earthen ramparts. Sitting on them, it was very convenient to accumulate the energy coming from thousands of people at the moment, for example, a goal was scored. After all, the earth is a superconductor, and emotions were off scale at such moments! " At one time, "Stalinets-Lokomotiv" was considered the main stadium of the capital: after the war, "Dynamo" was closed for restoration, "Luzhniki" still did not smell, so all the iconic games were held here. The audience rode to the matches from the then final Sokolniki on trams, thickly covering, including the roofs. The Moscow thieves had an unspoken rule: fan trams “don't pinch”, “because decent people go for sports to cheer” ...
Psychics from all over Moscow “recharged” on the “Lokomotiv”. Photo: RIA Novosti / Yuri Somov
"Toy" by Furtseva
Rumor has it that Luzhniki decided to build to distract Furtsev from ... suicide! The fact is that she once inadvertently spoke about her patron - Khrushchev and fell into "disgrace" with him. From a series of humiliations, Furtseva opened her veins (then she did this repeatedly), and Khrushchev with the words: "Climax she has, or something, the woman needs something to do" instructed her in 1954 to oversee the construction of the superstadium. zealously set to work ... The project was completed and approved in 90 days, and the whole country was involved in the construction. Volunteers came from all over the Union, building materials were brought from Leningrad and Yerevan, electrical equipment and oak beams for spectator benches from Ukraine, furniture from Riga and Kaunas.
Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow. 1968 year. Photo: RIA Novosti / Yuri Abramochkin
The Luzhniki was built in record time - 450 days! Alas, during the construction, the famous Trinity Church was destroyed, but they are going to restore it (like the legendary stadium itself) for the 2018 World Cup, which will be held in Russia. As in the glorious times of the "departure of the Olympic Bear", "Luzhniki" will have to become the main arena of the championship, which is well deserved: this stadium is remembered by millions of people and the unique Olympic Games-80, and the last concert of the Kino group, and the formation of our best football players , and even a unique dish of work Picasso, the shape of which, they say, was inspired by ... the Luzhniki arena! (The dish, by the way, is kept in the stadium's storerooms.) Brezhnev I came to cheer, although I didn’t like sports, ”employees of the Luzhniki Sports Museum told AiF. - Sometimes I liked to sit at the games of "Spartak", hockey. We kept a wide cup for him for tea. It seemed to him that his eyebrows might freeze, but a lot of steam rose from this cup. "
There are other stadiums in Moscow with an interesting fate ... So let's start going to them right now, without waiting for the official opening of the 2018 championship. Support for the athletes and training for us ...