British Lend Lease Aid and the Soviet War Effort, June 1941 June 1942

British Lend Lease Aid and the Soviet War Effort, June 1941 June 1942Author(s): Alexander HillSource: The Journal of Military History, Vol. 71, No. 3 (Jul., 2007), pp. 773-808Published by: Society for Military HistoryStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30052890 .

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British Lend-Lease Aid and the Soviet War Effort, June 1941-June 1942

Alexander Hill

Abstract The historiography of Allied assistance to the Soviet Union during the Great Patriotic War (1941-45) has paid little attention to deliveries made during the First Moscow Protocol period to the end of June 1942, during which Britain was the primary provider of aid. Whilst aid shipped during this period was limited compared to that for subsequent U.S.-dominated protocols, its significance has to be understood in the context of the military and economic situation faced by the Soviet Union during the first year of the war.

DURING DURING the first weeks and months following the German invasion of the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941, both foreign observers and many

within the Soviet Union itself saw Soviet survival as far from certain. In a matter of weeks the Red Army had lost millions of men and vast quantities of equipment, and Axis forces threatened both Leningrad and Moscow. Additionally, the Germans had seized vast expanses of Soviet territory along with a significant fraction of the country's population and much prime agricultural land. Much of the Soviet industrial plant was destroyed or captured, and a significant proportion of the remainder was in the process of evacuation to the east. Despite these factors Soviet

Alexander Hill is Associate Professor in Military History at the University of Cal- gary. His The War Behind the Eastern Front: The Soviet Partisan Movement in North-West Russia, 1941-1944 was published by Frank Cass in 2005.

The Journal of Military History 71 (July 2007): .773-808 Copyright @ 2007 by The Society for Military History. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission in writing from the Editor, Journal of Military History, George C. Marshall Library, Virginia Military Institute, P.O. Drawer 1600, Lexington, VA 24450. Authorization to photocopy items for internal and personal use is granted by the copyright holder for libraries and other users registered with the Copyright Clearance Center (CCC), 121 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923 USA (www.copyright.com), provided the appropriate fee is paid to the CCC.

*773



ALEXANDER HILL

forces were able to halt the Axis during the defensive phase of the Battle for Moscow, which according to Soviet sources raged from October to

early December 1941. The halting of the Axis advance before Moscow was undoubtedly a considerable achievement given how critical the situation might have seemed but weeks before.

Subsequent Soviet victory in what became known in the Soviet Union as the Great Patriotic War, despite its exorbitant cost, gave the Soviet regime a legitimating device with a far wider appeal than Marx- ism-Leninism or indeed victory in the Russian Civil War of 1917-21. In the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45 the Communist Party could claim to have both organised and inspired the Soviet people in order to achieve

victory over fascism and Germany, war against which had been such a

major contributory factor to the collapse of the Tsarist regime and the rise of the Bolsheviks in 1917. It is therefore understandable, and particularly in the context of the Cold War, that Soviet writing on the war

played down the role of Allied aid in the Soviet war effort, to the point that it was almost ignored. This aid, supplied by the United States, Britain, and the Commonwealth, was provided in the main without

charge under the U.S. Lend-Lease Act of March 1941 or its principles as described below and adopted by the British. Whilst the capitalist world could be accused of giving material assistance to the Soviet Union to save the lives of its own troops, it could not be reasonably accused of profi- teering at Soviet expense. Military and associated aid, provided at Soviet request, was a stark reminder of the limitations of the Soviet system under losef Stalin and the debacle faced by the Soviet Union as a result of Soviet foreign and defence policy on the eve of war.'

Throughout the late-Stalinist and post-Stalinist Soviet period, most Soviet authors were denied access to archival materials on the Soviet use of Lend-Lease aid, a topic very much off-limits for historians. During Nikita Khrushchev's premiership and a brief period afterwards, from at the earliest 1956 until the mid-1960s, historians were allowed much more leeway in what and indeed about what they wrote, to the extent of being able to acknowledge the contribution of Allied aid to Soviet victory, albeit in narrowly defined areas. Suggesting that Allied weapons systems were of significance at any point in the war was, however, unac- ceptable. The sixth and concluding volume of the then official Soviet his-

1. For a recent detailed and nuanced work on the debate over the nature of Soviet defence policy on the eve of war, see Evan Mawdsley, "Crossing the Rubicon: Soviet Plans for Offensive War in 1940-1941," International History Review 25, no. 4 (2003): 818-65. For a broader survey of arguments and debates on Soviet foreign and strategic policy leading up to the Great Patriotic War, see Alexander Hill, "Stalin and the West," in A Companion to International History, ed. Gordon Martel (Oxford: Blackwell, 2007).

774 * THE JOURNAL OF



British Lend-Lease Aid and the Soviet War Effort

tory of the Great Patriotic War, completed in 1965, noted that Allied deliveries:

were not inconsequential, especially the supply to troops and the rear of automotive transport, fuels and lubricants (from the USA and Britain 401,400 automobiles and 2,599,000 tons of oil products). But if speaking of the general increase in the armament of the Red Army, then the assistance of the Allies played, overall, an insignificant role.

During the war years 489,900 artillery pieces of all calibres, 136,800 aircraft and 102,500 tanks and self-propelled guns were delivered by Soviet industry. From the USA and Britain during the same period 9,600 artillery pieces, 18,700 aircraft and 10,800 tanks were received. .... In addition it was often the case that the Allies sent us already outdated examples of weapons. For instance tanks and a large proportion of the aircraft did not fully satisfy demands of weapons required by the character of military activity on the Soviet- German front.2

Shorter general works frequently limited references to Allied aid to the often cited claim, attributed to the wartime First Vice-Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars Nikolai Voznesenskii, that Allied aid represented "only 4 per cent" of Soviet production during the war.3 Men- tion of Allied aid would occasionally creep into military memoirs, but apparently only on the understanding that the value of Allied military equipment, and in particular weapons systems, was denigrated or at least compared unfavourably to Soviet equivalents (even if in very limited supply), to which there appear to have been very few exceptions. Photographs of Allied equipment in Soviet use were not, it seems, inten- tionally published in Soviet works concerned with wartime operations.

Despite considerable political and academic interest in Lend-Lease in the United States in particular, the lack of information on what hap- pened to aid once it reached the Soviet Union, and indeed on Soviet production and losses, prevented Western authors from coming to a balanced assessment of the significance of Allied aid for the Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War.4 Whilst a considerable English-language literature on the diplomatic dimensions of Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet

2. Institut Marxisma-Leninisma pri TsK KPSS, Otdel istorii Velikoi Otechestven- noi voini, Istoriia Velikoi Otechestvennoi voini Sovetskogo Soiuza 1941-1945, Tom shestoi, Itogi Velikoi Otechestvennoi voini (Moskva: Voennoe izdatel'stvo Minister- stva oboroni Soiuza SSR, 1965), 48.

3. M. Harrison, Accounting for War: Soviet Production, Employment and the Defence Burden, 1940-1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 134.

4. Although M. Harrison's Soviet Planning in Peace and War, 1938-1945 (Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985) deserves special commendation for its achievements in providing a context for assessing the value of Lend-Lease aid, despite the paucity of information available at the time on the wartime Soviet economy.

MILITARY HISTORY c 775



ALEXANDER HILL

Union emerged during the Cold War,5 such works contain very little detail on the use value of Allied aid to the Soviet war effort, as a result of the lack of access to Soviet archival sources and the limited content of Soviet secondary materials.6 Very little of what has been written focuses on British aid alone.7

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the debate on the significance of Lend-Lease aid for the Soviet war effort has become more

sophisticated in both the former Soviet Union and the West, thanks to a

large extent to the availability of a trickle of archival information on the use to which the Soviet Union put Allied aid, and also to greater academic freedom for Russian and many other former Soviet historians.8 More

general Western literature, and indeed much post-Soviet work in Russ-

ian, however, often still assumes that Lend-Lease aid became significant to the Soviet war effort only as deliveries increased from 1943 onwards, particularly in facilitating the forward movement of the Red Army with lorries and other transport resources.9 With the possible exception of air-

craft, the value of arms provided by Britain and the United States is often still played down, especially the significance of the relatively small quan-

5. Examples include R. H. Jones, The Roads to Russia: United States Lend- Lease to the Soviet Union (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1969). See also Leon Martel, Lend-Lease, Loans, and the Coming of the Cold War: A Study of the Implementation of Foreign Policy (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1979); and, focus- ing on the U.S. provision of aircraft to the Soviet Union, Richard C. Lukas, Eagles East: The Army Air Forces and the Soviet Union, 1941-1945 (Tallahassee: Florida State University Press, 1970).

6. For a work considering the impact of U.S. aid, published before the Soviet Union collapsed and relevant Soviet material became more available, see H. P. van Tuyll, Feeding the Bear: American Aid to the Soviet Union, 1941-1945 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1989). See also Roger Munting, "Lend-Lease and the Soviet War Effort," Journal of Contemporary History 19 (1984): 495-510.

7. The only example being J. Beaumont, Comrades in Arms: British Aid to Rus- sia, 1941-1945 (London: Davis-Poynter, 1980).

8. Perhaps the best published work on the significance of Lend-Lease aid for dif- ferent dimensions of the Soviet war effort is contained within M. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi 1941-1945 (Moskva: Andreevskii flag, 1997). See also Harrison, Accounting for War, Chap. 6. Useful material on specific dimensions to Lend-Lease aid has also been published by Russian-speaking authors in the Journal of Slavic Mil- itary Studies. See, for example, V. F. Vorsin, "Motor Vehicle Transport Deliveries through 'Lend-Lease,"' Journal of Slavic Military Studies 10 (June 1997): 153-75. For a somewhat exaggerated post-Soviet Russian revisionist assessment of the value of Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet war effort, see B. Sokolov, "Rol' lend-liza v sovetskikh voennikh usiliakh, 1941-1945," in Pravda o Velikoi Otechestvennoi voine (sbornik statei) (Sankt-Peterburg: Izdatel'stvo "Aleteiia," 1998), published in English in the Journal of Slavic Military Studies 7 (September 1994): 567-86.

9. See, for example, Walter S. Dunn, Jr., The Soviet Economy and the Red Army, 1930-1945 (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1995), 89; and van Tuyll, Feeding the Bear, 194-98.





tities delivered during the time of the First Moscow Protocol (agreement). In effect through 30 June 1942, the Protocol covered the only period during which Britain bore a heavier absolute burden in the provision of aid than the United States. A closer examination of deliveries during the First Protocol period in the context of Soviet production, losses, and force equipment levels, and a consideration of the use to which the aid was put, can, however, lead to a revised assessment of the relative significance of Allied, in particular British, aid to the Soviet war effort over time.

After establishing the context in which Britain became the principal provider of aid to the Soviet Union for the first year of the Great Patri- otic War, this article will examine the significance of this aid for the Soviet war effort during that period. It will argue that British Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union over the first year of the war, and including the later stages of the Battle for Moscow, was far more significant for the Soviet war effort than acknowledged in published Soviet sources or widely realised in the West, although it was certainly not decisive. The strength of this argument rests on Russian-language source material unavailable to Western and indeed to most Soviet authors prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Whilst much Soviet material on Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union remains "secret" in the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation and Russian State Archive of the Economy, or at least has not been declassified,10 valuable archival materials of the State Defence Committee (GKO)11 concerning Lend- Lease aid and the Soviet economy, held in the former Central Party Archive, were kindly made available to the author, and remain, to his knowledge, accessible to Russian and Western researchers.

Crucial in gaining an appreciation of the specific use to which British tanks were put during the first year of the war has been the publication of the wartime service diary of N. I. Biriukov, Military Commissar of the Main Auto-Armour Board of the Red Army from 10 August 1941 and responsible for the distribution of recently manufactured or acquired tanks to frontline units.12 Soviet and post-Soviet academic authors (that is, those providing scholarly apparatus) have been unwilling or unable to systematically trace British or U.S. tanks or indeed aircraft provided to the Soviet Union through to frontline units, a task made possible to a significant extent for armour by Biriukov's information on the units to

10. As much for want of funding to formally sort through the vast quantities of material still "secret" as the desire to keep much of the material classified, if reliable sources are to be believed.

11. Formed on 30 June 1941 for the coordination of the Soviet war effort and chaired by Stalin.

12. N. Biriukov, Tank-frontu! Zapiski sovetskogo generala (Smolensk: Rusich, 2005).




ALEXANDER HILL

receive such vehicles. This information can be used in conjunction with

published works and with the Order of Battle of the Soviet Army during the war,13 also unavailable to Western and to many Soviet researchers

prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, to gain a series of snap- shots of the relative importance of these imported tanks in the fighting before Moscow in late 1941 and into 1942.

Britain, the United States, and Aid to the Soviet Union

At the beginning of June 1941 Britain still stood alone against Nazi

Germany. Whilst the level of participation of the United States short of war was, by this point, significant, the United States was far from pre- pared to intervene in Europe, even without war in the Pacific. At the

beginning of September 1940 the "destroyers for bases" agreement had

finally been signed by Britain and the United States, with Britain paying a high price for fifty badly needed World War I-vintage destroyers, exchanged for ninety-nine-year leases on bases in the Caribbean. Safe after his November 1940 presidential reelection victory, President Franklin D. Roosevelt could increasingly move to make more substantial commitments than the "destroyers for bases" agreement to assist the

British, with whom relations were increasingly tense as ad hoc agree- ments for the delivery of war materials on a "cash and carry" basis had led to the rapid loss of British assets worldwide. The U.S. Lend-Lease Act, or Public Law 11, came into force in March 1941, allowing the executive, for an initial two-year period, to authorize the manufacture or pro- curement of items for transfer to any nation whose defence was deemed vital to that of the United States. By this point Britain had depleted its

gold reserves and had sold off a considerable proportion of its overseas assets to pay for purchases from the United States. With Britain facing practical bankruptcy, war materials provided under the Lend-Lease Act were crucial in sustaining the British war effort. Materials provided by the United States to the United Kingdom were to be categorized as expended, returnable, military, and nonmilitary, with payment to be required only for the latter, be it through reverse "Lend-Lease," the

exchange of information or technology, or ultimately through postwar settlement.

13. Voenno-nauchnoe upravlenie General'nogo shtaba. Voenno-istoricheskii otdel, Boevoi sostav Sovetskoi armii. Chast' I (iiun'-dekabr' 1941 goda) (Moscow: n.d.); and Chast' II (Ianvar'-dekabr' 1942 goda) (Moscow: Voennoe izdatel'stvo Min- istervstva oboroni SSSR, 1966). This information is, in part, now available in English translation in David Glantz, Companion to Colossus Reborn: Key Documents and Statistics (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2005).

14. See A. P. Dobson, US Wartime Aid to Britain (London: Croom Helm, 1986), Chaps. 1 and 2; and Jones, The Roads to Russia, Chap. 1.





To many U.S. Republicans in particular, the idea of providing military equipment to the Soviet Union was anathema, and even more so on such favourable terms as under the Lend-Lease Act. In Congress, there was hostility not only to communism per se but especially to Soviet communism, which had been accentuated by Soviet activities under the aus- pices or under cover of the Nazi-Soviet Pact of August 1939, including the occupation of the Baltic Republics and the invasion of Finland. Those most critical of the Soviet Union attempted to exclude it from future use of the Lend-Lease Act even before German troops crossed the Soviet frontier. Nonetheless, immediately after the German invasion of the Soviet Union and initial Soviet approaches to the United States, the U.S. government thawed frozen Soviet assets totalling $40,000,000 and opted not to apply the provisions of the Neutrality Act of November 1939 obstructing the sale of arms to the Soviets. These actions allowed the Soviet Union to purchase war materials from the United States subject to export permit. The first Soviet order was received by the United States on 30 June 1941, and a Soviet military mission arrived in the United States on 26 July. Nonetheless, opposition in the United States to assistance to the Soviet Union was significant, even if the Soviets acquired goods through purchase and not through the Lend-Lease Act. In July 1941 Congress reviewed legislation introduced to preemptively exclude the Soviet Union from Lend-Lease and indeed ensure the application of the Neutrality Act to the Soviets. Given the Soviet Union's long-term shortage of hard currency and diminishing gold reserves, the amount of military aid that the United States could provide to the Soviets would be strictly limited unless it could be supplied under the Lend-Lease Act. Such a move would also require negotiation with Britain, which in the short term at least would have to pass over to the Soviets some materials originally destined for British use.15

By the late summer of 1941, both Britain and the United States had received a considerable range of Soviet requests for aid. As early as 29 June 1941 the Soviet Union had requested 3,000 modern fighter aircraft and 3,000 bombers from the British, as well as items such as ASDIC (sonar) sets and antiaircraft guns. Also significant were requests for raw materials such as aluminium and rubber.16 Responses to Soviet requests for aid from the United Kingdom would be formally considered to be on a Lend-Lease basis only on 6 September, when Moscow received Prime Minister Winston S. Churchill's often-reproduced letter of 4 September. In this letter, responding to Stalin's message to Churchill of 3 September,

15. See Jones, The Roads to Russia, Chap. 2. 16. Most Secret, Hist. (R) 1, September 18, 1941, War Cabinet, Assistance to

Russia, 29th June, PREM 3/401/1, The National Archives (TNA), Kew, Surrey, United Kingdom.

MILITARY HISTORY * 779



ALEXANDER HILL

in which he used the word "sell" with regard to British fighter deliveries to the Soviet Union, Churchill pointed out that "any assistance we can

give you would better be upon the same basis of comradeship as the American Lend-Lease Bill, of which no formal account is kept in

money." Up to this point all items or materials were apparently deemed to be either purchases on credit with the expectation of eventual payment, be this in gold or raw materials, or, in the instance of the first 200 Tomahawk (P-40C) fighters, a "gift" from the United Kingdom." Whilst

requests for some items such as raw materials or naval supplies could be met immediately from British and Commonwealth stocks, the delivery of

significant numbers of weapons systems such as tanks and aircraft was more complicated. British plans to equip its own forces were dependent on U.S. supplies, and the addition of the Soviet Union into the equation required coordination between the two Anglo-Saxon powers prior to discussion with the Soviet Union.

Whilst the British government was relieved that the Soviet Union was now in the war, and hopeful that it would remain so, members were also concerned that aid to "Russia" from the United States would not

damage British military priorities.s8 This thought can only have been made all the more unpleasant by the fact that Britain had considered

going to war against the Soviet Union in early 1940 in order to aid the Finns.19 Of particular concern were deliveries of aircraft, especially medium and heavy bombers, which would be one of the few means for British forces to take offensive action against the Axis outside North Africa. At the Cabinet meeting of 19 September 1941, after British and U.S. military staffs had decided, broadly speaking, what could be offered to the Soviet Union at the Moscow Conference planned for the end of the

month, opponents and supporters of more wholehearted assistance to the Soviet Union were able to express their views a further time before

promises were made in Moscow. In the context of concerns about the

ability of the United States to fulfil existing promises to Britain, Sir Archibald Sinclair, Secretary of State for Air, leader of the Liberal Party,

17. Most Secret, Hist. (R) 1, 18 September 1941, War Cabinet, Assistance to Russia, 25th July and 4th September, Foreign Office to Moscow, PREM 3/401/1, TNA. The latter received 6 September, as Correspondence Between the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and ..., vol. 1, Correspondence with Winston S. Churchill and Clement R. Attlee (July 1941-November 1945) (Moscow: Progress Pub- lishers, 1957), 29-30. For Stalin's message to Churchill of 3 September, see ibid., 27-29. See also Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 22-23.

18. For an appreciation of these priorities, see Brian P. Farrell, "Yes Prime Min- ister: Barbarossa, Whipcord, and the Basis of British Grand Strategy, Autumn 1941," Journal of Military History 57 (October 1993): 599-625.

19. See Alexander Hill, "The Birth of the Soviet Northern Fleet, 1937-1942," Journal of Slavic Military Studies 16 (June 2003): 70-71.





and vociferous opponent of both of the continental dictatorships, questioned whether aircraft allocations to the Soviet Union would detract from British capabilities at home and in the Middle East, whether aircraft provided to Russia would be as effective in Soviet hands as in British, and why British aircraft should be sent to a Soviet Union not willing to provide information about its own, still sizeable production. However, by this stage the concerns of those such as Sinclair in the British cabinet, like the statements of the isolationists and dogmatic anticommunists in the U.S. Congress, were increasingly brushed aside. For those such as Lord Beaverbrook, Minister for Supply, it was crucial to make the "Rus- sians exact and substantial offers" so that they would continue the war, even if "the course of the war or limitations of transport" might prevent their fulfilment "in their entirety."20

As a result of Anglo-American discussions prior to the Moscow Con- ference, certain Soviet requests for aid had been turned down. At this point in the war, neither Britain nor the United States was willing to supply the eight destroyers requested by the Soviet Union,21 nor indeed did it seem likely that the nine minesweeping trawlers requested could be supplied, although the United States was apparently "looking into the possibility of production of the latter." Nonetheless, the United States and Britain went to the negotiating table in Moscow willing to supply 400 aircraft and 500 tanks per month, the provision of which, if cuts to allocations to the British and U.S. forces were not to be severe, would require significant increases in U.S. output.22 British estimates of its future loss of aircraft strength, due to a large extent to deliveries to the Soviet Union, stood at 13 percent for medium and heavy bomber squadrons, 14 percent for light bombers, and 9 percent for fighters.23

Between 28 September and 1 October, representatives of the Soviet Union, the United States, and Britain attended the Moscow Supply Con- ference, where the United States made commitments to supply 1,500,000 tons of supplies to the Soviet Union during the First Moscow

20. Secret, D.O. (41) 62nd Meeting, War Cabinet, Defence Committee (Opera- tions), Minutes of Meeting held on Friday 19th September 1941 ..., PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

21. Destroyers would in fact be supplied to the Soviet Union only in the summer of 1944 in lieu of the Soviet share of the Italian fleet. The Soviet Northern Fleet was provided with Town Class ships supplied to Britain under the "destroyers for bases" agreement, albeit with weapons and electronics fits appropriate for a later stage of the war. See Arnold Hague, Destroyers for Great Britain: A History of the 50 Town Class Ships Transferred from the United States to Great Britain in 1940 (London: Green- hill Books, 1990).

22. Secret, D.O. (41) 11, 22 September 1941, War Cabinet, Conference on British-United States Production and Assistance to Russia, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

23. Ibid., Enclosure IV.




ALEXANDER HILL

Protocol, which covered the period to 30 June 1942. The Soviets were to

pay for the supplies, in part, by cash advances on gold deliveries and by supplying raw materials in the future. Attempts in Congress failed to

specifically exclude the Soviet Union from the second Lend-Lease appro- priation, which passed into law on 28 October and preserved the right of the President to designate Lend-Lease countries. By this point U.S. neu-

trality was increasingly a myth, in view of the U.S. warships convoying non-U.S. merchantmen as far as Iceland and the United States estab-

lishing a presence in Iran on the basis of a Presidential Directive of 13

September. On 7 November 1941 Roosevelt finally declared the defence of the Soviet Union essential to that of the United States, and incorporated the Soviet Union in the provisions of the Lend-Lease Act.24

Nonetheless, even meeting commitments under the First Moscow Proto- col to supply 1,500,000 tons of goods to the Soviet Union by 30 June 1942 was a challenge to the U.S. administration as the industrial giant started to flex its muscles. This left the United Kingdom as the senior

partner in the provision of aid to the Soviet Union for the period of the First Protocol, even if some weapons supplied by Britain to the Soviet Union came from British Lend-Lease allocations or previous direct purchases from the United States.25 In addition the British would play the dominant role in the actual delivery of aid during the First Protocol

period. Because supply routes via Iran and Alaska would require devel-

opment, more than 90 percent26 of the delivered equipment and materials arrived at the Soviet ports of Archangel and Murmansk via the

increasingly perilous sea route around German-occupied Norway, from which German submarines, surface ships, and aircraft could launch attacks on these "northern" or "Arctic" convoys.27

Commitments and Aid of the First Moscow Protocol

In terms of basic weapons systems, the United Kingdom and the United States had committed in Moscow to supply the Soviet Union with

24. Jones, The Roads to Russia, Chap. 2. 25. A good example of U.S.-manufactured equipment being supplied to the

Soviet Union as British aid is the 200 Tomahawk fighters mentioned above. 26. According to Soviet summary data, 99.6 percent of aid by tonnage arrived

through northern ports during 1941, and 83.9 percent during 1942. Otchet o rabote Importnogo upravleniia [NKVT] po importu i eksportu vooruzheniia i oborudovaniia s 22.06.1941 g. po 01.01.1946 g., 02.03.1946, f.413.o.9.d.555.1.17, Russian State Archive of the Economy (RGAE), Moscow. My thanks to Mikhail Suprun for providing me with this report.

27. Accessible accounts of these convoys are provided in Paul Kemp, Convoy! Drama in Arctic Waters (London: Brockhampton Press, 1999); and Richard Wood- man, Arctic Convoys (London: John Murray, 1994).





200 aircraft each per month until the end of June 1942, along with 250 tanks, giving totals of 3,600 and 4,500 respectively over a nine-month period. However, initial British deliveries of tanks would be 300 per month, "decreasing to 250 as American supplies increase." As for aircraft, the commitment was to supply, in full, the quantity requested by the Soviet Union. However, the requested ratio of 300 light and medium bombers to 100 fighters would be replaced by 200 fighters per month from the United Kingdom and 100 of each from the United States in order to satisfy British demands to be able to preserve the expected rate of expansion of its bomber forces.28 The relative significance of British deliveries would be increased temporarily during December 1941 by the U.S. reaction to the outbreak of war with Japan, as until 17 December 1941 U.S. supplies destined for the Soviet Union were apparently unloaded from merchant vessels still in U.S. ports and provided to U.S. forces.29

When Allied, and in particular British, deliveries of key weapons systems for the war as a whole are compared to Soviet production for the same period, they can understandably be viewed as being of little significance. If Soviet production of tanks and self-propelled guns is taken as 110,340 for the whole war,30 then 4,542 tanks supplied by Britain might seem unimportant.31 However, Soviet production of principal types of tanks and self-propelled guns (T-34, KV series, and light tanks) was in the region of only 4,649 for the second half of 194132 and 11,178 for the first six months of 1942,33 giving a total of 15,827 from the end of June 1941 to the end of June 1942. British deliveries alone during this time,

28. (Cypher), Special (Lord Beaverbrook), From British Supply Mission, Moscow, to Foreign Office, Lord Beaverbrook, No. 42 Linen, 3rd October, 1941, WO 193/580, TNA; and Secret, W.P. (41) 238, 8 October 1941, War Cabinet, Moscow Con- ference, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

29. According to Soviet sources, 447 out of 457 aircraft at U.S. ports awaiting shipment to the Soviet Union were recalled for U.S. use between 13 and 17 Decem- ber 1941. Of the aircraft and tanks to be provided by the United States under the First Protocol, 95 U.S. aircraft and 27 tanks had arrived in the Soviet Union through the end of December 1941, and 106 aircraft and 139 tanks were in transit. Iz spravki Nar- odnogo komissara vneshnei torgovli SSSR A.I. Mikoian o vipolnenii Angliei i SShA obiazatel'stv, priniatikh na Moskovskoi konferentsii trekh derzhav, po postavkam v SSSR vooruzheniia, oborudovaniia i sir'ia za oktiabr'-dekabr' 1941 g. [9 ianvaria 1942 g.], in G. N. Sevost'ianov, et al., eds., Sovetsko-amerikanskie otnosheniia. 1939-1945 [Rossii. XX vek. Dokumenti] (Moskva: MFD, 2004), 192-93.

30. N. Simonov, Voenno-promishlennii kompleks SSSR v 1920-1950 godi (Moskva: ROSSPEN, 1996) 164.

31. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 358. 32. Simonov, Voenno-promishlennii kompleks, 162. 33. Harrison, Soviet Planning, 251.




784 A A A A

Table

1

Characteristics

of British

Matilda

and

Valentine

Tanks

in Action

during

the

Battle

for

Moscow

Alongside

Principal

Contemporary

German

and

Soviet

Models

and

U.S.

M3

Light

Tanks

Supplied

to the

Soviet

Union

Type

Armament

Speed

Weight

Range

Armour

(mm)

(mm)

(mph)

(tons)

(miles)

Hull

Glacis

Driver's

Sides

Deck

Belly

Tail

Turret

Turret

Turret

nose

plate

plate

front/sides

rear

top

Mk

II

lx40mm

L/50

15

26.5

150

78

47

40-70

20

13-20

55

75

75

20

Matilda

(111)

(93

rounds)

+

1x7.92

MG

Mk

III

x40mm

L/50

15

16

110

60

30

60

60

17

7-20

60

65/60

65

20

Valentine

(79

rounds)

+

(II)

1x 7.92

MG

Pzkpfw

IIIF

1x50

L/42

25

20

109

30

25

30

30

17

16

21

30

30

10

(99

rounds)

+

2x7.92

MG

Pzkpfw

1x37.2

L/47.8

35

8.4

125

25

25

25

15-19

10

8

12

25

15

10

38(t)C

(90

rounds)

+

2x 7.92mm

MG

T-26S

1x45mm

L/46

16.8

10.1

215

25

25

25

16

10

10

16

25

10

(165

rounds)

+

2x7.62

MG

BT-7-2

1x45mm

L/46

33

13.8

220

22

22

22

13

6-10

6-10

13

15

10

(188

rounds)

+

2x7.62

MG

KV-1

1x76.2

L/41.2

22

42.8

140

70+25

75

75+35

75-77

25

35

75

75+35/75

35

(111

rounds)

+

3(2?)x7.62

MG

T-34/76B

1 x76.2

L/41.2

32

27.6

188

45-47

45-47

45-47

20

20

45-47

45

45

16

(77

rounds)

+

2x7.62

MG

M3

Stuart

I 1 x37

L/50

36

12.2

70

51

13

38

25

10

10-12

19-25

38/30

30

13

(103

rounds)

+

1 x7.62

MG

Source:

Relevant

entries

in Eric

Grove,

World

War

II Tanks

(London:

Black

Cat,

an imprint

of Macdonald

and

Co.,

1987).




largely the period of the First Moscow Protocol, come to 1,442, or about 9 percent of Soviet production.34

Under the provisions of the First Moscow Protocol, Britain supplied to the Soviet Union Matilda (MK II) and Valentine tanks, the most effective tanks the British had available in any numbers in 1941.35 Canada would eventually produce 1,420 Valentines, almost exclusively for delivery to the Soviet Union from 1942.36 Table 1 gives characteristics of appropriate marks of Matilda and Valentine heavy and medium tanks compared to principal German models in the field at the end of 1941, along with Soviet medium and heavy tanks of the same period. Details of the M3 Light tank (Stuart I) supplied by the United States to both Britain and the U.S.S.R. at the time are also provided. Whilst the main arma- ments of the Matilda and Valentine were increasingly satisfactory only for light tanks, and their lack of a high-explosive capability for dealing with larger calibre antitank gun threats was a significant drawback, their armour put them firmly in the heavy and medium categories, respectively. As Table 1 indicates, the protection offered by the armour of both the Matilda and Valentine was superior to all but the KV-1 and T-34.

Whilst the Matilda and Valentine were certainly inferior to the T-34 and KV-1, it is worth noting that Soviet production of the T-34 (and to a lesser extent the KV series), was only just getting seriously underway in

1942,37 and hence the relative inferiority of British tanks to the Soviet armoured pool as a whole was less during this period than it would be only a few months later, after the First Protocol period. It is also worth noting that Soviet production was well below plan targets. For instance, production of the T-34 at Factory Number 112, according to a State Defence Committee decree of 9 July 1941, was supposed to rise from 10 units in August 1941 to 250 by December, a total of 710 units over five months.38 The reality was, in itself a significant achievement given the

34. Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, 7 September 1942, War Cabinet, Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 17, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

35. Some of this material on British tanks up to the end of 1941 was published as Alexander Hill, "British 'Lend-Lease' Tanks and the Battle for Moscow, November- December 1941--A Research Note," in the Journal of Slavic Military Studies 19 (June 2006): 289-94.

36. See Report No. 38, historical Section (G.S.), Army Headquarters, 27 July 1950, Tank Production in Canada, http://www.forces.gc.ca/dhh/downloads/ahq/ ahq038.pdf. On 31 January 1942 only fifteen Canadian-produced Valentines had arrived in the Soviet Union, increasing to thirty by 4 March. See Secret A.S.E. (1942) 74, 4th March 1942, War Cabinet, Allied Supplies Executive, Military Supplies to Rus- sia: Progress Report .... Extract .... Tanks, DO 35/1047/4, TNA.

37. See Simonov, Voenno-promishlennii kompleks, 163-64. 38. GKO, Postanovlenie No.GOKO-82/ss ot 9 iiulia 1941 g. Moskva, Kreml', Ob

obespechenii proizvodstva tankov T-34 na zavode "Krasnoe Sormovo,"




ALEXANDER HILL

British tanks, apparently loading for shipment to the Soviet Union, exact date unknown. In the foreground, Matilda heavy tanks, and in the background Valentine medium tanks. (Photo courtesy of the Tank Museum, Bovington, U.K. print #991/D3.)

conversion of this factory from the series production of submarines to armoured vehicles, the production of 173 units to the end of 1941.39 Pro- duction targets continued to be unrealistic into 1942; for example, Fac- tory Number 112 had targets to produce a total of 1,240 units during June-September 1942 alone, where actual production was 2,584 for 1942 as a whole.40 From 22 June to 31 December 1941, according to Colonel-General G. F. Krivosheev, only 3,200 medium and heavy tanks were delivered to the Red Army, figures including Lend-Lease equipment starting to filter through.41 Nikolai Simonov gives production of the T-34

f.644.o.1.d.1.1.272, Russian State Archive for Socio-Political History (RGASPI), Moscow, Russia.

39. Simonov, Voenno-promishlennii kompleks, 163. 40. GKO, Postanovlenie No.GOKO-1880/ss ot 5 iiunia 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml', O

proizvodstve tankov T-34, f.644.o.1.d.38.1.266, RGASPI; and Simonov, Voenno- promishlennii kompleks, 163.

41. Along with 2,400 light tanks. G. F. Krivosheev, ed., Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses in the Twentieth Century (London: Greenhill Books, 1997), 252; and Simonov, Voenno-promishlennii kompleks, 162.





and KV series for the second half of 1941 as 2,819 units, and Mikhail Suprun notes that 361 heavy and medium British Lend-Lease tanks had reached the Red Army by this point, a total of 3,180.42

Both the Matilda and the Valentine required modification for service in Russian conditions. The pneumatic transmission on Matildas, for instance, could not stand up to the temperatures in Russia and required replacement with mechanical alternatives.43 Not only were the track plates on Valentines considered too narrow, and suitable only for summer conditions, but spurs were regarded as necessary in Russian conditions and had to be manufactured locally. British-supplied track pins were viewed as weak and difficult to replace.44 Understandably considering the 40 mm gun on both the Matilda and Valentine to be inadequate, the Soviets made abortive attempts to up gun both, the Matilda with a 76 mm gun.45 Whilst both faced contemporary German tanks during British service in North Africa, in Soviet service they were apparently used increasingly often in defensive operations or for infantry support in conjunction with Soviet tanks.46 This limitation was certainly realistic from the second half of 1942 onwards, but prior to this, Soviet stocks of medium and heavy tanks did not always permit the relegation of British tanks to supporting roles.

Assessment of the significance of British deliveries of armour during the first year of the war requires, however, the consideration of not only relative quality and British deliveries as a proportion of Soviet production, but also the scale of Soviet losses and resulting force levels; during the period of the First Moscow Protocol Soviet losses approached and at times exceeded domestic supply, making any additional inputs significant.47 Whilst the Soviet Union had developed tanks far superior to those in service in Britain and the United States, and indeed of such effectiveness as to drive Germany to produce the overcomplicated Panther in response to the T-34 and KV-1, the Soviets not only did not have the planned quantities of these types, but were barely able to maintain force levels in the face of horrendous losses. According to Krivosheev, the Soviet Union lost 20,500 tanks between 22 June and 31 December 1941, of which 3,200 were either heavy or medium, with an initial stock of such types of 1,400. Only 5,600 tanks were received during the same

42. Simonov, Voenno-promishlennii kompleks, 162; and Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 52.

43. Biriukov, Tanki-frontu! 62 and 68-69. 44. Secret Cipher Telegram, From: 30 Military Mission, To: The War Office, Recd

22/11/41, WO 193/580, TNA. 45. Biriukov, Tanki-frontu! 55 and 71. 46. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 52. 47. Harrison, Soviet Planning, 114 and 264; and Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties

and Combat Losses, 252.




ALEXANDER HILL

period, of which, as noted above, only 3,200 were medium or heavy tanks including imports.48 By the end of 1941, out of 750 promised tanks, Britain had delivered 466, of which 259 were Valentines and 187

Matildas, the remainder apparently Tetrarch. Of these, 216 Valentines and 145 Matildas had been supplied to the Red Army.49 With total Red

Army tank stocks, as of 31 December, consequently being in the region of 7,700 according to Krivosheev (or 6,347 on 1 December according to

Suprun), of which only 1,400 were medium or heavy models, then British deliveries to date represented in the region of only 6.5 percent of total Red Army tank strength, but over 33 percent of medium and heavy tanks, with British vehicles actually in Red Army hands representing about 25 percent of medium and heavy tanks in service.50

Given disruption to Soviet production and high losses, the Soviet Union was understandably concerned to put British and U.S. armour into action as soon as possible, quickly attempting to amend the most

easily remedied defects. A good indication of Soviet efforts to these ends can be gained from the service diary of N. I. Biriukov, Military Commis- sar of the Main Auto-Armour Board of the Red Army from 10 August 1941. According to Biriukov's notes, the first 20 British Valentine tanks arrived at the tank training school in Kazan' on 28 October 1941, at which point a further 120 were unloading at Archangel.51 Courses for the

preparation of Soviet crews for Valentines and Matildas had started dur-

ing November whilst the first tanks, with British assistance, were being assembled from their in-transit states and undergoing testing by Soviet

specialists.52 According to the British Military Mission in Moscow, by 9 December

1941 about 90 British tanks had been in action with Soviet forces.53 On 20 November 1941 Biriukov reported that 137 and 139 Tank Battalions of 146 Tank Brigade, along with 131 Independent Tank Battalion, had been equipped with 21 Valentines each; 132 Independent Tank Battalion had 19 Valentines and 2 Matildas; 138 Independent Tank Battalion had 15 Matildas and 6 Valentines; and 136 Independent Tank Battalion had 3 Matildas and 9 Valentines.54 Of these units, the British Military Mission was referring to 146 Tank Brigade and 131, 136, and 138 Independent

48. Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses, 252; and Suprun, Lend- liz i severnie konvoi, 52.

49. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 49 and 52. 50. Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses, 252; and Suprun, Lend-

liz i severnie konvoi, 53. 51. Biriukov, Tanki-frontu! 16 and 47. 52. Ibid., 51-55. 53. Secret Cipher Telegram, From: 30 Military Mission, To: The War Office, Reed

11/12/41, WO 193/580, TNA. 54. Biriukov, Tanki-frontu! 57.




Black Sea 131

012

14 11

10 dik,,

4-ss IMAoscow 8

91

5 6 i7

3

ulf of n

Lake Ladoja

2 NWNe( ea

1

Barents Sea 1. Murmansk 2. Archangel 3. Leningrad 4. To Kazan' 5. Ivanovo 6. Kalinin 7. Riga 8. Smolensk 9. Minsk 10. Tula 11. Kiev 12. Rostov 13. Sevastopol 14. Kursk

// Front line as of early December 1941

S0 300

miles (approx)




ALEXANDER HILL

Tank Battalions. The first of these units to have been in action seems to have been 138 Independent Tank Battalion, which as part of 30 Army of the Western Front, along with 24 and 145 Tank Brigades and 126 Inde-

pendent Tank Battalion, was involved in stemming the advance of Ger- man units in the region of the Volga Reservoir to the north of Moscow in late November. In fact the British intercepted German communications

indicating that German forces had first come into contact with British tanks operated by the Soviets on 26 November 1941.55 More widely noted are the exploits of 136 Independent Tank Battalion, part of a scratch

operational group of 33 Army of the Western Front, consisting of 18 Rifle

Brigade, two ski battalions, 5 and 20 Tank Brigades, and 140 Independent Tank Battalion. The latter was combined with 136 Independent Tank Bat- talion to produce a tank group of only 21 tanks, which was to operate with the two ski battalions against German forces advancing to the west of Moscow in early December. In action with the Western Front from early December was 131 Independent Tank Brigade with 50 Army to the east of Tula to the south of Moscow. Also seeing action was 146 Tank Brigade with 16 Army of the Western Front from early December in the region of Kriukovo to the immediate west of the Soviet capital.56

According to Marshal P. A. Rotmistrov, at the end of November 1941 there were only 670 Soviet tanks, of which only 205 were heavy or medium types, for the Fronts before Moscow, that is, the recently formed Kalinin, Western, and South-Western Fronts. Most of this tank strength was concentrated with the Western Front, with the Kalinin Front having only two tank battalions (67 tanks) and the South-Western two tank brigades (30 tanks).57 Alternative figures suggest that of 667 tanks with frontline units of the Kalinin, the Western, and the right wing of the South- Western Fronts as of 1 December 1941, 607 were with the Western Front, including 205 which were KV series and T-34s; the Kalinin Front and the right wing of the South-Western Front had 17 and 43 tanks respectively, none of which apparently were KV series or T-34s.58 Either set of figures is a significant improvement on the 141 heavy and medium tanks available to the Western, Reserve, and Briansk Fronts before Moscow as of 1 Octo- ber 1941.59 In the light of these statistics, it is reasonable to suggest that

55. See Eastern Europe, Miscellaneous, On 26/11 .... , 0630/27/11/41, CX/MSS/470/T17, HW 1/267, TNA. A "Front" was roughly comparable to a German army.

56. P. A. Rotmistrov, Vremia i tanki (Moskva: Voenizdat, 1972), 107-18, http://militera.lib.ru.

57. Ibid., 112. 58. Not including 9, 17, and 24 Tank Brigades. "Moskovskaia bitva v tsifrakh

(period kontrnastupleniia)," in Voenno-istoricheskii zhurnal, no. 1 (1967): 92. 59. "Moskovskaia bitva v tsifrakh (period oboroni)," in Voenno-istoricheskii

zhurnal, no. 3 (1967):71.





British-supplied tanks made up in the region of 30 to 40 percent of the heavy and medium tank strength of Soviet forces before Moscow at the beginning of December 1941, and that they made up a significant proportion of such vehicles available as reinforcements at this critical juncture.

By the beginning of January 1942, those British-supplied tank units that had been fighting before Moscow at the end of November and during December were at low strength, even if new units were being equipped with tanks that had been delivered in the meantime. On 21 January 1942 Biriukov noted that 26 Valentines of 80 Tank Brigade, to operate together with 20 T-60s, were heading in the direction of Kursk for frontline service. He also stated that 36, 37, and 38 Tank Brigades were equipping with British tanks; by 27 January 1942 36 Tank Brigade had 21 T-34s, 24 Valentines, and 48 T-60s; and both 37 and 38 Tank Brigades were to receive Matildas instead of Valentines.60

A steady stream of British-supplied tanks was provided to Soviet units during the spring and summer of 1942. From 10 May 1942 British tanks were sent to reinforce the Briansk and Kalinin Fronts and South- Western napravlenie,61 with the South-Western napravlenie to receive 90 Matildas and 70 Valentines during May 1942.62 According to Suprun, immediately prior to July 1942 and therefore at the end of the First Moscow Protocol period, the Red Army had 13,500 tanks in service, of which 2,200, or 16 percent, were imported, and of which over 50 percent were British.63 However, mechanical problems, in part due to Soviet unfamiliarity with this new, foreign equipment, kept in the region of 50 percent of imported tanks out of service at any one time up to the end of 1942. Soviet sources did, however, note the general relative reliability of the Leyland engines of Matildas compared to Soviet models.64

Whilst by late 1942 Soviet production made British tank supplies increasingly less significant, aircraft deliveries, the importance of which arguably exceeded that of tanks during the First Moscow Protocol period, remained significant into 1943. Soviet combat aircraft production from the end of June 1941 to the end of June 1942 was in the region of the fig- ure of 16,468 aircraft given by Mark Harrison.65 By the end of June 1942

60. Biriukov, Tanki-frontu! 84 and 89. 61. A napravlenie was a Soviet command consisting of more than one adjacent

Front. 62. Biriukov, Tanki-frontu! 148-49. On the Soviet use of tanks delivered by

the Arctic convoy PQ-12 in March 1942, see Alexander Hill, "The Allocation of Allied 'Lend-Lease' Aid to the Soviet Union Arriving with Convoy PQ-12, March 1942-a State Defence Committee Decree," Journal of Slavic Military Studies 19 (December 2006): 727-38.

63. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 123. 64. Ibid., 52. 65. Harrison, Soviet Planning, 251. See also Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties and

Combat Losses, 254.




ALEXANDER HILL

the United Kingdom had delivered 1,323 fighter aircraft, or about 8 percent of Soviet production from the start of the war.66 Given that Soviet combat aircraft losses for this period at best approached domestic supply, and were especially severe for the first six months of the war, then British deliveries alone are of some significance, particularly when tak-

ing into account the extremely high Soviet losses of the first weeks of the

war, which depleted prewar stocks. According to Krivosheev, total Soviet combat aircraft losses for the period 22 June to 31 December 1941 were

17,900. Added to the 20,000 stocks on 22 June 1941 were 9,900 delivered during the period concerned, giving a force level of approximately 12,000 at the end of 1941. Specifically regarding fighters, Krivosheev lists stocks on 22 June 1941 as about 11,500, augmented by 6,000 received during the period to 31 December, but with losses of 9,600, giving a force on 31 December of 7,900.67 Convoys had delivered 699 aircraft to Archangel by the time the destination changed to Murmansk in December 1941, due to winter ice in the White Sea.68 Of these aircraft, 99 Hurricanes and 39 Tomahawks were already in service with the Soviet air defence forces (PVO) as of 1 January 1942,69 out of a total of

1,470 (6.7 percent) as detailed in Table 2, with the Northern Fleet being a major recipient as described below.70

Those aircraft types supplied by Britain, either from domestic production or from British orders from the United States, such as the Tom- ahawk, Kittyhawk (P-40E), and Hurricane, were inferior to the latest marks of the German Bfl09, and indeed in aspects of performance to the latest Soviet types. Britain was reluctant to supply Spitfires to the Soviet Union given its own needs.71 Initial Soviet concerns about the Hurricane focused on its armament and armour. The Soviets not only viewed the armour plating protecting the pilot as inadequate against medium cali-

66. Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, September 17, 1942, War Cabinet, Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 17, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

67. Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses, 254. See also Harrison, Soviet Planning, 114 and 251.

68. Severnie konvoi: Issledovaniia, vospominaniia, dokumenti. Vip.3 (Moskva: Andreevskii flag, 2000), 328.

69. As distinct from airpower attached to particular Fronts, or of the navy, responsible for the air defence of naval bases.

70. Iu. Izotikov, "Na kakikh samolotov letal Pokhrishkin, ili ne boites' britantsev, dari prinosiashchikh?" Vestnik protovozdushnoi oboroni, no. 4 (1991): 35. On the Northern Fleet, see below.

71. Nonetheless, by late 1942 they were being supplied in small numbers. On 3 November 1942, 49 of 150 promised had been dispatched to the Soviet Union, with the remainder due to be sent by the end of the month. Extract from A.B.E. (42) 21st meeting held on Tuesday, 3rd November, 1942, Supplies of Aircraft to the USSR, AIR 20/3904, TNA.





Table 2

Aircraft in service with the air defence forces (PVO) of the Soviet Union 1941-1942

Year Available on 1 Jan 42 1942 Type of aircraft Total Written off

1-153 264 143 52 1-16 .........411 ...........333 ........131 MiG-3 351 409 192 LaG G -3 ................170 ...........418 ........172 Yak-1 136 261 119 Yak-7 ................. -...........109 .........17 Hurricane 99 468 121 Tomahawk ..............39 ............56 .........15 Kittyhawk - 98 56 P-39 ......- .............12 ..........3 Total 1470 2307 878 Of which Lend-Lease .....138 ...........634 ........195 c Lend-Lease 9.4 27.5 22.2

Source: Iu. Izotikov, "Na kakikh samoletakh letal Pokrishkin, ili ne boites' britantsev, dari prinosiashchikh?" Vesnik protivovozdushnoi oboroni, no. 4 (1991): 35.

bre ammunition at ranges of 50 to 200 metres, but also considered the all-machine-gun armament as weak. The latter was to prompt a Soviet programme of rearmament to two 20 mm cannon and two 12.7 mm heavy machine guns.72 However, according to Soviet experts, 80 percent of the specialist equipment of British aircraft such as the Hurricane, for example, radio and navigational equipment, was so valuable that they recommended it be manufactured by Soviet industry.73

Tables 3 and 4 (following page) allow comparison of key characteristics of Soviet fighters in service with the Soviet air defence forces (PVO) in 1941-42 with Lend-Lease aircraft in Soviet service in significant numbers, along with the latest production mark of the German Bf109 as of the end of 1941. Whilst Soviet pilots praised the maneuverability of the

72. Secret Cipher Telegram, Reed AMCS 0112 hrs. 4.7.42, To: Air Ministry, From: 30 Mission, AIR 20/3904, TNA; and Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni. Postanovlenie No. GKO-1291ss ot 16 fevralia 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml', O perevooruzhenii samolotov "Kharrikein," f.644.o.1.d.21.1.96, RGASPI.

73. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 51.




Table 3

Key characteristics of Soviet-manufactured aircraft in service with the Soviet PVO 1941-1942

Type of aircraft Armament Max Time to Service Operational speed 16,400 feet ceiling Range

1-153 (1940) 4x 7.62 mm (16,750 ft) (Prototype) 34,750 ft MG 265 mph 6.1 min

1-16 Type 29 1x12.7 mm MG (14,250 ft) (Prototype) 32,000 ft (1940) 2x7.62 mm MG 286 mph 6.8 min

MiG-3 (1941) 1x12.7 mm MG (25,500 ft) 5.3 min 39,500 ft 509 miles 2x7.62 mm MG 398 mph

LaGG-3 (1941) 1x20 mm (16,500 ft) 8.5 min 30,500 ft 438 miles cannon, 2x 332 mph 12.7 mm MG

Yak-i (1941) 1x20 mm (15,750 ft) 6.8 min 32,500 ft (1940) 434 cannon, 2x 348 mph miles 7.62 mm MG

Yak-7B 1x20 mm (12,000 ft) 5.8 min 32,500 ft 400 miles cannon, 2x 354 mph 12.7mm MG

Source: Yefim Gordon and Dmitri Khazanov, Soviet Combat Aircraft of the Sec- ond World War, vol. 1, Single-Engined Fighters (Leicester: Midland Publishing, 1998), 174-77.

Table 4

Key characteristics of Lend-Lease aircraft in service with the Soviet PVO 1941-1942, compared with German Bfl09

Type of aircraft Armament Max Time to Service Operational speed 16,400 feet ceiling Range

Hurricane IIA 8x.303 in MG (11C) (11C) (11C) (IIC) (Max) (18,000 ft) [30,000] 35,600 ft 920 miles 329 mph 12 min 30 sec

Tomahawk IIA 2 x .5 in MG (15,000 ft) 32,400 ft (Max) 1,230 (P-40B) 2 x .3 in MG 352 mph miles

Kittyhawk IA 6x .5 in MG (5,000 ft) [10,000] 29,000 ft (Max) 850 (P-40E) 335 mph 4 min 48 sec miles

Bf109F-2 1 x 15 mm MG (19,685 ft) [16,400] 36,090 ft (Max) 528 cannon, 2x 373 mph 5 min 12 sec miles 7.9 mm MG

Source: Appropriate entries in Elke C. Weal, John A. Weal, and Richard F. Barker, Combat Aircraft of World War Two (Agincourt, Ontario: Gage Trade Publishing, 1977).




- British Lend-Lease Aid and the Soviet War Effort

A Hurricane fighter operating from northern Russia during the early winter of 1941. These aircraft of 151 Wing were initially flown by British pilots before being handed over to the Soviets. (Photo courtesy of the Imperial War Museum, #CR58.)

1-153 Chaika and 1-16 Rata fighters, both still in use in significant numbers in 1941, both types were certainly obsolete and inferior to the Hur- ricane in almost all regards.74 The Hurricane was also both rugged and tried and tested, and arguably at least as useful at that point as many potentially superior Soviet designs such as the LaGG-3 and MiG-3, which were suffering considerable teething troubles in early war production aircraft. For instance, in the LaGG-3, of which there were apparently only 263 in the Soviet inventory by the time the Soviet Moscow counteroffensive started on 5-6 December 1941, eight "serious" defects, many the result of "poor manufacturing standards," were identified in

74. Nonetheless, only the previous summer, when the British, who were as des- perate then for aircraft as the Soviet Union was in the second half of 1941, were looking to purchase fighter aircraft abroad, the British Air Ministry considered the 1-16, although they viewed it, arguably unreasonably, as comparable to the Gloucester Gladiator biplane fighter! It was mooted that China might be a suitable go-between in any purchases, given the diplomatic unacceptability of direct sales of such aircraft to Britain (and indeed, the purchase of tanks was also suggested). The proposal, unsur- prisingly, did not get anywhere. See discussions in AIR 8/372, TNA.




ALEXANDER HILL

early production aircraft by the newly formed Flight Research Institute. At the end of 1941 the MiG-3 was more numerous, but was considered difficult to fly. The Yak-1, arguably the best of the batch and superior in most regards to the Hurricane, suffered from "airframe and engine" defects in early war production aircraft.75

Fighter aircraft being supplied by the British to the Soviet Union in late 1941 were, compared to Soviet types, best suited to interceptor and escort rather than ground support roles, for instance. It is therefore

unsurprising that many such Lend-Lease aircraft served with the Soviet air defence forces or with naval aviation-as of 5 December 1941 about 15 percent of the aircraft of 6 Fighter Air Corps defending Moscow were Tomahawks or Hurricanes.76 Such aircraft would continue to be supplied for service near Moscow in the coming months, as indicated, for

instance, by the distribution of aircraft delivered with convoy PQ-12 in March 1942. Of 136 Hurricanes, 60 were destined for the Karelian Front, 40 for 6 Air Corps of the PVO (Moscow), and 36 for 22 Replacement Air

Regiment at Ivanovo.77 Six air regiments of Hurricanes were to be cre- ated during March for the High Command reserve by a GKO order of 3 March 1942.78 Of these, 191 Air Regiment at least seems to have been

replenishing, having converted to Hurricanes in November 1941 before service with the Kalinin Front.79 As shown in Table 2, by the end of 1942, 468 Hurricanes had seen service with the Soviet air defence forces alone, of which 347 remained active.80

Regarding other aircraft, which in many instances the British had either purchased in the United States or supplied from their own Lend- Lease allocations, as early as 12 October 1941 the Soviet 126 Fighter Air

Regiment was operating with Tomahawks, the first Soviet unit to be equipped with this aircraft.81 In addition to Hurricanes, the aircraft delivered by the British convoy PQ-12 in March 1942 included 44 Kittyhawks (P-40E), described in Russian documents at this stage as Tomahawks, to

75. Gordon and Khazanov, Soviet Combat Aircraft of the Second World War, 1:28-29, 69, 126.

76. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 52. 77. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni, Postanovlenie No. GKO-1497s ot 26

marta 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml'. . . . raspredeleniia pribivshego iz-za granitsi s 12-m karavanom vooruzheniia ..., f.644.o.1.d.25.1.106, RGASPI.

78. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni, Postanovlenie No. GKO-1376ss ot 3 marta 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml', O formirovanii aviapolkov v reserv Stavki Verkhnogo Glavnogo Komandovaniia, f.644.o.1.d.23.11.46-7, RGASPI.

79. N. F. Kuznetsov, Front nad zemlei (Moskva: Voenizdat, 1970), 73-77; and N. G. Bodrikhin, Sovetskie asi. Ocherki o sovetskikh letchikakh (Moskva: ZAO KFK, "TAMP," 1998), 114, http://militera.lib.ru.

80. Izotikov, "Na kakikh samolotov letal Pokhrishkin," 35. 81. A. G. Fedorov, Aviatsiia v bitve pod Moskvoi (Moskva: Nauka, 1975),

114-15, http://militera.lib.ru.





be distributed amongst the Karelian Front (10), 27 Replacement Air Reg- iment (for the Leningrad Front) (20), and 6 Air Corps of the PVO (14).82 Genuine Tomahawks (P-40C) also served in late 1941 in defence of the "Doroga zhizni," or "Road of Life," across the ice of Lake Ladoga to the besieged city of Leningrad. On 8 December 1941, 20 Tomahawks of 159 Fighter Air Regiment were allocated to the defence of the ice road from airfields at Shugozero and Podborov'e.83 Even without 154 Fighter Air Regiment, also equipped with Tomahawks and also committed to the defence of communications between Leningrad and the Soviet territory to the east, the 20 Tomahawks of 159 Fighter Air Regiment represented almost 14 percent of the fighter strength of the Front (20/143) at the end of November and more than 11 percent of the total aircraft strength of the Front (20/175) at the end of December 1941, according to data provided by the commander of the air forces for the Leningrad Front, later Marshal A. A. Novikov.84 As with much Western equipment, the process of training was hampered by a lack of technical documentation, particularly in Russian, and Soviet unwillingness to seek British technical assistance.85

It is important to remember, especially given the historiography of Lend-Lease in Soviet literature, which was as much a product of the Cold War as understandable Soviet pride in its wartime industrial achievements, that Lend-Lease aid items were requested by the Soviet Union. Whilst models of weapons systems supplied might not always have been those desired, for example, Hurricanes instead of Spitfires, nonetheless what was requested was subject to genuine need. In this context, raw materials not subject to any quality concerns (be they justifiable or not), such as aluminium and rubber, requested from the Allies and supplied in significant quantities by Britain and the Commonwealth, should be seen as having been of significance. Britain promised 18,000 tons of aluminium during the First Moscow Protocol period and had supplied 14,147 tons by the end of June 1942. Soviet production of aluminium was 67,600 tons for the whole of 1941, dropping to 51,700 tons for 1942. During the same period 34,856 tons of rubber, a raw material subject to

82. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni, Postanovlenie No. GKO-1497s ot 26 marta 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml', . . . raspredeleniia pribivshego iz-za granitsi s 12-m karavanom vooruzheniia ..., f.644.o.1.d.25.1.106, RGASPI.

83. Prikaz Komanduiushchego VVS Leningradskogo fronta Voenno-vozdushnim silam, 8 dekabria 1941 g., in Blokada Leningrada v dokumentakh rassekrechennikh arkhivov, ed. N. L. Volkovskii (Moskva/Sankt-Peterburg: Izdatel'stvo Poligon, 2004), 242-43.

84. V. Romanenko, "P-40 v sovetskoi aviatsii," http://www.lend-lease.airforce.ru/ articles/romanenko/p-40/index.htm; and A. A. Novikov, V nebe Leningrada (zapiski komanduiushchego aviatsiei) (Moskva: Nauka, 1970), 230.

85. As documented in the war diary of the British Military Mission to Moscow, 31 December 1942, points 38-44, ADM 223/252, TNA.




ALEXANDER HILL

increasing shortage in the Soviet Union, was delivered.86 The total of

54,000 tons initially promised was revised down to 42,000 tons in light of the war with Japan. Also worthy of note were medical supplies from the United Kingdom and India, although deliveries fell far short of Soviet demands.s7

Britain delivered to the Soviet Union a range of items that the Sovi- ets could produce but not in the desired quantities, be this due to the loss of plant or the disruption caused by its evacuation, possibly in the context of limited initial capacity. An example of this category of aid is telecommunications equipment. A significant shortage of field telephone sets for the Red Army was highlighted in a State Defence Committee decree of 20 July 1941. Whilst the People's Commissariat for Communi- cations could be ordered to seize 20,000 standard sets from subscribers in order to free up field sets at supply dumps, hospitals, air defence sites, and other rear-area objectives, such a solution was only a stop-gap one. Gor'kovsk Factory Number 197 of the People's Commissariat for Electri- cal Industry was ordered to reestablish the manufacture of field sets, in

part because field telephone production had been disrupted by the evacuation of Factory Number 8 from Leningrad to Molotov, where this fac-

tory was scheduled to restore production in September with a planned output of 5,000 for that month.88 The actual output for this factory in November was only 1,000 units, prompting on 6 December 1941 fresh exhortations to increase production from the State Defence Committee, which described the existing performance at all factories as "extremely unsatisfactory," and reminded their directors of their "personal respon- sibilities" for the fulfillment of these military orders.89 In this context Lend-Lease aid could to some extent make up for shortfalls in Soviet production. Whilst only 2,010 field telephones and 7,565 kilometres of cable

86. One ramification being that in 1942, the crews of T-34s had a more unpleasant ride as rubber rims on the wheels were sacrificed.

87. Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, September 17, 1942, War Cabinet, Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 18, PREM 3/401/7, TNA; and Harrison, Accounting for War, 195. Whilst not within the scope of this article, it is worth noting that raw materials were provided to the Western Allies by the Soviets under reverse Lend-Lease. To 30 June 1942, these included 20,243 tons of chrome ore and 10,000 railway sleepers, excluding supplies for the Middle East. War Cabinet, Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 25.

88. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni, Postanovlenie No. GKO-227ss ot 20 iiulia 1941 g. Moskva, Kreml', O postavke Narkomatu Oboroni sredstv sviazi, f.644.o.1.d.3.1.209, RGASPI.

89. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni, Postanovlenie No. GKO-998 ss ot 6 dekabria 1941 g. Moskva, Kreml', O plane proizvodstva i postavkakh osnovnikh sredstv sviazi dlia Glavnogo Upravleniia Sviazi KA v dekabria 1941 goda, f.644.o.1.d.16.1.62, RGASPI.





had been delivered through Archangel by the end of navigation during 1941, these items were delivered outside the Moscow Protocol, in response to urgent Soviet request. The Soviet Union had in fact asked for 6,000 field telephones per month at the end of September 1941.90 Britain could offer only 2,000 immediately, with the promise of similar quantities in future months.91 Whilst it was subsequently decided that the United States would take over the whole order, nonetheless these 2,000 phones, and an additional 2,000, were shipped by Britain by the end of the First Protocol Period, along with more than 30,000 kilometres of cable and 400 switchboards.92 During 1942, 23,311 field telephones would be delivered through Murmansk alone by the United States and Britain, along with more than 280,000 kilometres of field telephone cable.93

The Soviet Union experienced production and supply problems with radio sets similar to those for land-line communications, sustaining horrendous radio equipment losses during the retreat of the summer and autumn of 1941. According to Krivosheev, whilst on 22 June 1941, 37,400 sets were available to the Red Army, by 31 December 1941 total stock was only 19,300 due to losses of 23,700 and new supplies totaling only 5,600 sets.94 Whilst Britain had supplied only 333 separately listed sets through Archangel by the end of navigation in 1941, British equipment such as tanks and aircraft were typically equipped with radio sets, contrary to the Soviet norm.95

This finally brings us to high technology items such as radar and ASDIC sets, in the development of which the Soviet Union lagged far behind Britain, the United States, and Germany. Whilst ASDIC will be dealt with below during the examination of the local application of British aid, we will take British GL-2 sets as an initial example of the sort of radar technology supplied to the Soviet Union during the first year of the war. These sets were provided to the Soviet Union for the purpose of air defence. Whilst the effectiveness of such early "gun-laying" radars was limited to giving accurate range and limited elevation data, their use

90. Severnie konvoi: Issledovaniia, vospominaniia, dokumenti. Vip.3, p. 328; and Secret Cipher Telegram, To: No. 30, Military Mission, Moscow, From: The War Office, Reed 1435/30/9/41, WO 193/580, TNA.

91. Secret Cipher Telegram, From: The War Office, To: No. 30 Military Mission, Moscow, Desp. 2145 1/10/41, WO 193/580, TNA.

92. Secret Cipher Telegram, From: Beaverbrook Mission, To: The War Office, Reed 2225 2/10/41, WO 193/580, TNA; and Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, 17 September 1942, War Cabinet, Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 19, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

93. Severnie konvoi: Issledovaniia, vospominaniia, dokumenti. Vip.2 (Moskva: Nauka, 1994), 220.

94. Krivosheev, Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses, 258. 95. Severnie konvoi: Issledovaniia, vospominaniia, dokumenti. Vip.3, 328.




ALEXANDER HILL

by the sea increased effectiveness in determining elevation.96 Six such sets arrived in Murmansk with the convoy PQ-13 in March 1942, fol- lowed by more.97 The Soviets perceived these sets as sufficiently valuable to be the subject of a State Defence Committee decree of 10 February 1942, which required that Soviet industry copy the GL-2 set as the SON-

2, requested the importation of key components, and indeed allocated 100 metal-cutting machine tools from imported supplies for the estab- lishment of production.98

The import of such items as metalworking machinery highlights the fact that Lend-Lease aid items were at times a factor in increasing Soviet

production or establishing the production of new items. Convoy PQ-12 alone, arriving in March 1942, delivered 312 metal-cutting machine

tools, in addition to a range of other items for Soviet industry such as machine presses and compressors. The principal recipient of the metal-

cutting tools in this instance was the People's Commissariat for the Avi- ation Industry, which received 239 tools.99 The number of machine tools delivered by Britain was, even in terms of Soviet wartime production, limited. Britain shipped 1,210 machine tools during the period of the First Protocol, compared to Soviet production (excluding presses) for 1941 of 44,510 and for 1942 of 22,935.100 However, the raw figures ignore the fact that the Soviet Union could request specific items which it may or may not have been able to produce for itself. Additionally, many of the British tools arrived during the first quarter of 1942, when Soviet production was, according to Suprun, only 2,994. The impact of relatively small numbers of machine tools ordered according to requirements should not, as Suprun goes on to suggest, be underestimated. For

instance, the handing over of 40 imported machine tools to Aviation Fac-

tory Number 150 in July 1942 was apparently crucial in enabling the fac-

tory to reach projected capacity within two months.101

96. Louis Brown, A Radar History of World War II--Technical and Military Imperatives (Bristol and Philadelphia: Institute of Physics Publishing, 1999), 59-60.

97. Severnie konvoi: Issledovaniia, vospominaniia, dokumenti. Vip.2, 220. 98. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni, Postanovlenie No. GKO-1266ss ot 10

fevralia 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml', O priniatii na vooruzhenie voisk PVO Krasnoi Armii i Voenno-Morskogo Flota Stantsii Orudiinoi Navodki (SON-2) i organizatsii otechestvennogo proizvodstva SON-2, f.644.o.l.d.21.1.31, RGASPI.

99. Gosudarstvennii Komitet Oboroni. Postanovlenie No. GKO-1497s ot 26 marta 1942 g. Moskva, Kreml'... raspredeleniia pribivshego iz-za granitsi s 12-m karavanom vooruzheniia ..., f.644.o.l.d.25.1.112, RGASPI.

100. Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, September 17, 1942, War Cabinet. Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, PREM 3/401/7, TNA; and Harrison, Accounting for War, 196.

101. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 122.





The Local Application of British Aid Whereas basic weapons systems supplied by Britain were an impor-

tant top-up to Soviet production during the First Protocol period, it can be argued that in addition to the supply of raw materials and machinery, British aid had the most significant impact, albeit not always immediately, in technological areas where British expertise and production were most advanced compared to the Soviet Union, generally on the periph- ery of the Soviet war effort. The geographical area in which Lend-Lease aid from Britain can be argued to have had the most significant impact on the Soviet war effort during the first year of the war was in the far north, and in particular for the Northern Fleet.102 Much of the material initially requested by the Soviet Union from Britain was naval, in the development and production of which Britain maintained a considerable technological lead in many spheres. The Soviet Union had cut its own production of naval equipment at the beginning of the war and transferred capacity to other, more pressing needs on land, as in the case of Factory Number 112 switching capacity from the production of submarines to tanks. The Soviet historical and wartime neglect of naval forces made sense in the 1930s and during the summer and autumn of 1941 when the focus was on the Red Army, but having turned back Ger- man forces before Moscow, the Soviets understood the significance of northern waters for both the delivery of Allied aid and Soviet internal communications and recognized that naval forces had a role to play in the Soviet war effort.

Lend-Lease ships, aircraft, and equipment, when combined with the Soviets' own war and to some extent British experience, would go some way to make up for the relative neglect of Soviet naval forces since the October Revolution in 1917. Given the significance of the northern route as the principal conduit for Lend-Lease aid, from the outset the Soviet naval command, as one would have expected, pressed the Northern Fleet to take measures for the protection of convoy traffic and ports, be it through minesweeping or antisubmarine measures in the White Sea, or providing air cover for the unloading of transports in port.103 The "basic task" (osnovnaia zadacha) of the Northern Fleet for most of the war was

102. This section draws on material first published in Alexander Hill, "The Birth of the Soviet Northern Fleet," 65-82, an extended version of which was published as "The Soviet Northern Fleet 1939-1942," in Flot i pobeda . . . , ed. V. Il'in (Arkhangel'sk: Administratsiia Arkhangel'skoi oblasti, 2004), 100-116.

103. Direktiva Voennomu sovetu SF o tralenii min v Belom more, 30 iiulia 1941 g. and Prikaz o merakh po prikritiiu s vozdukha transportov v raione Murmanska, 28 ianvaria 1942 g., in Russkii arkhiv: Velikaia Otechestvennaia. Prikazi i direktivi Narodnogo Komissara VMF v godi Velikoi Otechestvennoi voini. T.21 (10) (Moskva: Terra, 1996), 42 and 88.




ALEXANDER HILL

"the provision of security for external convoys," a tacit admission of the

significance of the convoys for the Soviet Union104; an order to this effect was issued on 15 March 1942.105 By this point the ability of the Northern Fleet to carry out this mission had been eased by British aid, ranging from the provision of minesweepers and aircraft to depth charges, radar, and ASDIC sets, all of which the Soviet Union had requested during the first months of the war.

As of 22 June 1941 the Northern Fleet had not increased its basic

minesweeping strength of two trawlers transferred to the Northern Flotilla in June 1933.106 By mid-September "more than 30" trawlers fitted out for minesweeping had been added to the Northern Fleet, but modern trawl gear was scarce, and hence the Soviets specifically asked for minesweepers and sweep gear under Lend-Lease.107 In addition to

minesweeping equipment for fitting to Soviet vessels, the Soviet Union also requested nine minesweepers. Whilst numerous minesweepers were

provided to the Northern Fleet by Britain and the United States during the war, in 1941 any sort of escort vessel was in short supply in Britain. There was some doubt whether these could be supplied before August 1942, the alternative being for nine Soviet trawlers to make their way to Britain where they would be fitted out and their crews trained for the

spring of 1942.108 Nonetheless, as early as March 1942 the first of seven British "TAM" type trawler conversions delivered in February-March 1942 was incorporated into the Northern Fleet; the first "MMS" type purpose-built naval trawlers arrived with the convoy PQ-18 in September 1942.109

Early in the war Soviet technology lagged behind that of Britain and

Germany in a number of aspects of mine warfare, despite the strength of

104. N. G. Kuznetsov, Kursom k pobede (Moskva: OLMA-PRESS, 2003): 277. 105. Direktiva komanduuishchemu SF ob obespechenii perekhoda konvoev, 15

marta 1942 g., in Russkii arkhiv: Velikaia Otechestvennaia: Prikazi i direktivi narodnogo komissara VMF v godi Velikoi Otechestvennoi voini, 108.

106. Upravlenie voenno-morskikh sil RKKA, I upravlenie. 14 iiunia 1933 g. No. 353395/ss. I.d. komandira Murmanskogo voennogo porta tov. Trukhaninu, f.r- 970.o.2.d.1.1.16, Russian State Archive of the Navy (RGA VMF), St. Petersburg, Rus- sia.

107. I. D. Spasskii, ed., Istoriia otechestvennogo sudostroeniia v piati tomakh, Tom IV, Sudostroenie v period pervikh piatiletok i Velikoi Otechestvennoi voini 1925-1945 gg. (Sankt-Peterburg: Sudostroenie, 1996), 433; and V. M. Ioltukhovskii, Kontaktnie trali otechestvennogo flota (Sankt-Peterburg: Izdatel'stvo "Gangut," 2000), 21.

108. List of articles of naval supply ordered by Soviet mission in London, Item 24, Requested 6.9.41, Minesweepers, CAB 111/203, TNA.

109. A. B. Shirokorad, Korabli i katera VMF SSSR 1939-1945 gg (Minsk: Khar- vest, 2002), 500-503.





the Tsarist navy in this regard. The development of noncontact mines caused particular concern even before the outbreak of hostilities between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. In August 1940 the British naval attache in Moscow noted an "unexpected friendliness" towards British service attaches by Soviet liaison officers apparently not shown for at least three years. Of some interest were British dealings with Ger- man magnetic mines.110 Whilst the British could not claim to have neu- tralised the threat from such mines, they had relevant experience to pass on to the Soviet Union. The first British shipment of war materials to the Soviet Union via the northern route with the minelayer Adventure contained 200 "secret" magnetic mines. From the autumn of 1941, the mission of British minesweepers operating from Soviet bases was to assist the Northern Fleet with minesweeping and to "familiarize them with the new types of mine," in addition to providing local escort for arriving convoys.111 British aid to June 1942 outside the Moscow Protocol included parts and plans for equipment for dealing with magnetic mines.112

Soviet antisubmarine capabilities were also inadequate, in particular in the sphere of submarine detection. The Soviet Union had obtained acoustic and hydroacoustic equipment for submarines and surface vessels from British sources in 1926 and received them the next year. In 1928 an investigation as to why these resources had not been utilized noted that "attempts to construct [skonstruirovat'] this apparatus with our own resources have been unsuccessful," indicating the scale of the technical gap emerging between the Soviet Union and Britain in this sphere.113 The first crude "hydroacoustic" submarine detection devices (gidroakusticheskie sredsvta or GAS) appeared on Soviet vessels only in 1940. Prior to the war Soviet destroyers were not fitted with any form of active underwater detection device. As A. V. Platonov, S. V. Aprelev, and D. N. Siniaev note, in the main "Soviet sailors did not achieve the first level of awareness" of their antisubmarine warfare capabilities, "not guessing that they were not capable of dealing with submarines. Only in October 1941, when on one hand we felt the first blows from under the sea, and on the other hand the first British ASDIC sets were received, did Soviet sailors become aware of the complexity of the problem and ...

110. British Embassy, Moscow, 26th August 1940, Dear Admiral Godfrey [Direc- tor of Naval Intelligence] .... [Signed] Clancy, ADM 223/506, TNA.

111. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 36 and 41. 112. Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, September 17, 1942, War Cabinet, Report on

fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 20, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

113. SSSR, Narodnii Komissariat po Voennim i Morskim Delam, Pomoshchnik nachal'nika Voenno-Morskikh Sil RKKA Po Politicheskoi Chasti, 27 dekabria 1928 g. Nachal'niku Voenno-morskikh sil R.K.K.A., f.r-1483.o.1.d.72.1.8, RGA VMF.




ALEXANDER HILL

the poverty of domestic . . . acoustic systems."114 Consequently, despite the handing over of five modern Gnevnii-class destroyers to the North- ern Fleet during 1939-40, the antisubmarine capabilities of the Soviet Northern Fleet as a whole remained poor prior to and during the first

years of the war. Antisubmarine warfare had been one of the topics of particular inter-

est to the Soviet liaison officers who questioned the British naval attache in August 1940. From the summer of 1941 ASDIC sets, in addition to

ASDIC-equipped vessels, were high on the Soviet list of priorities for

delivery from Britain, which committed to supply the 150 sets initially requested.115 Whilst this number was subsequently reduced to 100 for the period concerned, only 57 sets had been provided by the end of 1942.116 Those sets supplied were nonetheless of significance given the state of Soviet antisubmarine capabilities, even if their mastery (osvoe- nie) and fitting to Soviet vessels would take some time. Repair offered an

opportunity for the fitting of ASDIC sets to Soviet vessels; for instance, the destroyer Gromkii was equipped with ASDIC during repairs at Fac-

tory No. 402 at Molotovsk from 20 June to 9 October 1942.117 By this

point the "guardship" Groza had apparently used ASDIC (Drakon-128s) to locate, attack, and damage a German U-boat on 10 September 1942.118 Instructional ASDIC equipment was provided to the Soviet navy outside the Moscow Protocol.119 It is also worth noting that Northern Fleet stocks of depth charges stood at only 6,834, or 27.8 percent of the perceived requirement, on 22 June 1941.120 As a result of a Soviet request, the

114. A. V. Platonov, S. V. Aprelev, and D. N. Siniaev, Sovetskie boevie korabli 1941-1945 gg. IV Vooruzhenie (Sankt-Peterburg: Al'manakh "Tsitadel'," 1997), 115.

115. British Embassy, Moscow, 26th August 1940, Dear Admiral Godfrey [Direc- tor of Naval Intelligence] .... [Signed] Clancy, ADM 223/506, TNA; and [To] B.A.D. Washington. 21.10.41, Secret, Naval Cipher X by cable, From Admiralty, CAB 111/203, TNA.

116. Most Secret, W.P. (42) 417, 17 September 1942, War Cabinet, Report on fulfillment of the Moscow Protocol, October, 1941-June, 1942, p. 17, PREM 3/401/7, TNA.

117. L. G. Shmigel'skii, "Molotovskii zavod No.402 i severnie konvoi," in Sev- ernie konvoi: Issledovaniia, vospominaniia, dokumenti. Vip.3, p. 82; and A. V. Platonov, Entsiklopediia Sovetskikh nadvodnikh korablei 1941-1945 (Sankt-Peter- burg: Izdatel'stvo "Poligon," 2002), 178.

118. R. I. Larintsev, "Lend-lizovskie postavki na Severnii flot i ikh effektivnost'," in Voina v Arktike (1939-1945 gg.), ed. M. N. Suprun (Arkhangel'sk: Pomorskii gosudarstvennii universitet, 2001), 268; and Platonov, Entsiklopediia Sovetskikh, 254 and 259.


120. Platonov et al., Sovetskie boevie korabli, 62.





Northern Fleet was to receive 4,000 depth charges, and a consignment of depth charges arrived in Archangel with the minelayer Adventure on 1 August 1941.121

In addition to the ASDIC sets provided for, in particular, Soviet destroyers, Allied-supplied radar sets for the detection of aerial and surface threats had considerable significance to the Northern Fleet. Prior to the war the Soviet navy had only a single warship equipped with a radar set of any type, this being the cruiser Molotov.122 One Soviet and British priority was the air defence of ports, for which the British-supplied GL- 2 sets mentioned earlier were used. More valuable than the gun-laying sets were Type 271 naval search sets and ASV (Air-to-Surface Vessel) sets for the location of submarines and surface targets. A Type 271 set had been installed on the British corvette Orchis in March 1941, and by September 1941 was in general use on British escort vessels. Trials suggested that, depending on conditions, a fully surfaced submarine could be detected at a range of approximately 5,000 yards, a conning tower at about 2,800, and 8 feet of periscope at 1,300 yards. The British escort Vetch is credited with the first detection with the 271 set leading to a kill, having located the German submarine U-252 at a range of about 7,000 yards during an attack on the convoy OG-82 in April 1942.123 By the end of June 1942 six radar sets for fitting to Soviet destroyers had been supplied to the Soviet Union outside the Moscow Protocol.124 Any British concerns about providing the latest such detection technology to the Soviet Union involved not the recipient, with which Britain had briefly considered going to war in early 1940 over the Soviet invasion of Fin- land, but the increased chance that an example would fall into the hands of the Germans, who would develop countermeasures.125

Regarding naval aviation,126 on the eve of war the fighter strength of the Fleet was provided by the 72nd Mixed (Air) Regiment, equipped with forty-two 1-15 and 1-153 Chaika biplanes, which, whilst still of some value in the hands of skilled pilots, were obsolete. To a lesser extent this

121. Boevaia letopis' Voenno-morskogo flota 1941-1942 (Moskva: Voennoe izdatel'stvo 1983), 41.

122. Platonov et al., Sovetskie boevie korabli, 112. 123. Anthony Watts, The U-Boat Hunters (Abingdon, Oxon: Purnell Book Ser-

vices Ltd by arrangement with Macdonald and Jane's Publishers, 1976), 131-32 and 138-39.


125. Secret, C.O.S. (42) 168, 11th March 1942, War Cabinet, Chiefs of Staff Committee, Supply of Type 271 RDF Sets and ASV Sets to Russia, WO 193/580, TNA.

126. With responsibility for the defence of naval bases, in addition to other tasks.




ALEXANDER HILL

was also true of the 1-16 monoplane, of which only three were available.127 It is therefore unsurprising that on a fact-finding mission to Mur- mansk during the summer of 1941, the British Rear-Admiral Philip Vian had found fighter defences "quite inadequate to allow a force to use it as a base with safety," being another reason, in addition to the proximity of German ground forces to Murmansk and the better port facilities at

Archangel, for the first convoys to head for the latter.128 Although LaGG-3, MiG-3, and to a lesser extent Yak-1 fighters were

being delivered to frontline units in relatively small quantities prior to the war, the Northern Fleet was a long way down the list of potential recipients for recent aircraft types. In fact, even by 1 December 1941, despite the growing significance of the far north as a maritime link with

Britain, only four MiG-3s, perhaps the least satisfactory of the latest Soviet types, had found their way to the Fleet. By this point Lend-Lease aircraft were of considerable significance to the Northern Fleet, making up 29 out of a total of 65 aircraft, with British-supplied Hurricanes com-

paring favourably to available Soviet types.129 By February 1942, 44 out of 90 aircraft of the Northern Fleet were of foreign manufacture.130

By April 1942 the Hawker Hurricane had clearly become the principal fighter of the Northern Fleet. Both 2nd Guards Red Banner Mixed Air

Regiment and 78th Fighter Air Regiment, based at Vaenga, were reliant on the British Hawker Hurricane fighter. The former had 50 Hurricanes, of which 30 were operational, and four MiG-3s, of which three were operational. The latter had 33 Hurricanes, of which 17 were operational, in addition to 12 I-16s, of which 9 were operational. Additional fighter strength was provided by 27th Fighter Air Regiment equipped with 29 I- 15s at more than one location, of which 27 were operational.131 By 1 July 1942, 83 out of 109 fighter aircraft of the Northern Fleet were of foreign manufacture. 132

Whilst the low state of readiness of the Lend-Lease aircraft might have been due in part to their more intensive use, it is also indicative of the Soviet failure either to make full use of British technical support or to ensure adequate Soviet alternative provision. The problem was, however, exacerbated at times during the early stages of the war by a less- than-adequate supply of spares, a problem not confined to the Soviet

127. Doklad po inspektsii Severnogo flota 11-17 maia 1941g (21 maia 1941g), f.r-1678.o.l.d.230.1.180, RGA VMF.

128. Capt. S. W. Roskill, The War at Sea 1939-1945, vol. 1, The Defensive (Lon- don: HMSO, 1954), 488.

129. Larintsev, "Lend-lizovskie postavki," 263. 130. Suprun, Lend-liz i severnie konvoi, 51. 131. Khronika Velikoi Otechestvennoi voini Sovetskogo Soiuza na Severnom

teatre s 1.01.42--30.06.42 gg. (vipusk 2-i) (Sankt-Peterburg: Galeia Print, 1999), 60. 132. Larintsev, "Lend-lizovskie postavki," 263.





Union, and by the significant numbers of reconditioned rather than new aircraft supplied by Britain.133 An additional problem having a limited impact on the overall value of British aid, and in particular concerning items shipped during the second half of 1941, was damage in transit. Soviet complaints, and indeed the percentages involved, were sufficiently serious for the Lord Chancellor's Office to launch an inquiry. The report at the end of January 1942 attributed much of the damage to the urgency with which equipment was stowed for shipping and to the inad- equacy of packaging, in particular for deck-stowed equipment.134

British Aid during the First Year of the Great Patriotic War

During 1941-42 the United States was unable to supply material aid to the Allies, and in particular the Soviet Union, in anything like the quantities it would subsequently provide. In this period the United States was not only shifting industrial capacity to a relatively neglected military sector, but also building up its own armed forces to levels appropriate to the opposition faced. The quantitative British and Common- wealth contribution to the Lend-Lease supply pool was therefore far more significant during the period of the First Moscow Protocol than it would subsequently be. The quantity of British and Commonwealth inputs was, however, certainly small compared to both U.S. and Soviet production for the war as a whole, and indeed, as this article has shown, when compared to Soviet production of key items for the first year of the war. However, Soviet losses were so high compared to production during the first year of the Great Patriotic War that even British supplies of basic weapons systems became significant in a period when Soviet production was recovering from the loss and relocation of industrial capacity as a result of the Axis invasion. British aid would also go some way to com- pensating for unrealistic planning in the Soviet Union, both in topping up Soviet production and providing scarce resources on demand, even if with delay, which could, as in the case of machine tools, for instance, unclog bottlenecks and put unused capacity in the system to use. Qual- itatively, British aid in particular could also, during the first months of

133. For lengthy discussion on these matters, see Secret, Supply of Hurricanes and Hurricane spares to the U.S.S.R., Notes of a meeting at the Air Ministry 11th Jan- uary 1943, Present: Air Chief Marshal Sir Christopher Courtney . . . Rear Admiral Kharlamov . . . , AIR 20/3904, TNA. By September 1942 it was apparently being widely claimed in the Soviet Union that the Hurricane should not be supplied to the Soviet Union because of its obsolescence. See, for example, Secret, Cypher Telegram, WX2980, Reed ... 15/9/42, To: Air Ministry. From: 30 Mission, AIR 20/3904, TNA.

134. Secret, Inquiry into damaged supplies for Russia, Lord Chancellor's Office, House of Lords, January 31, 1942, PREM 3/401/4, TNA.




ALEXANDER HILL

the war, "fill in the gaps" in Soviet production and research and devel-

opment in areas outside the principal foci of Soviet efforts, such as naval

technology and even "basic" naval equipment, even if the rewards in terms of Soviet capabilities in this area were not necessarily immediate.

Finally, and perhaps just as important although difficult to assess, was the psychological impact of British readiness to support the Soviet Union on the Soviet population, and indeed, on the leadership. Particularly early in the war, the Soviet population was reminded that it was not alone in the fight against Nazi Germany135, but was now part of an alliance which would have seemed unthinkable only months before when there was the genuine prospect of the Soviet Union and Germany both being at war with Britain and France, had the latter two intervened in Finland. As for the Soviet leadership, it was clearly comforting to be

increasingly aware that, despite prewar animosities, the West was willing to provide, with few questions asked and without financial recompense, not only significant quantities of equipment and raw materials, but also some of the latest technology.

It would be difficult and unconvincing to argue that Lend-Lease aid "saved" the Soviet Union from defeat in 1941. Axis forces were, for instance, halted before Moscow with Soviet blood, and to a large extent with Soviet-manufactured arms and equipment. Nonetheless, as this article has suggested, Lend-Lease aid provided during the period of the First Moscow Protocol had a far more significant impact on the Soviet war effort and indeed on frontline capability both during and after the Battle for Moscow than the Soviet and indeed Western historiography would suggest. What is perhaps of particular note is not only the speed with which Britain in particular was willing and able to provide aid to the Soviet Union after initial hesitation, but how quickly the Soviet Union was able to put foreign equipment into use. This is testimony both to the political and military realism of Churchill and other key British cabinet ministers in this instance, and to the effectiveness of the Soviet command economy when faced with a clearly defined task.

135. See, for example, the speech made by Stalin, 6 November 1941, which mentions specific types of aid provided by Britain and the United States to the Soviet Union. J. Stalin, The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union. Wartime Addresses and Orders of the Day ... (New York: International Publishers, 1945), 30-31.

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