Architect of Soviet Victory in World War II This page intentionally left blank Architect of Soviet Victory in World War II The Life and Theories of G.S. Isserson RICHARD W. HARRISON Foreword by David M. Glantz McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Jefferson, North Carolina, and London LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGUING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Harrison, Richard W., ¡952– Architect of Soviet victory in World War II : the life and theories of G.S. Isserson / Richard W. Harrison ; foreword by David M. Glantz. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7864-4897-5 softcover : 50# alkaline paper 1. Isserson, G.S. 2. Isserson, G.S.—Political and social views. 3. Intellectuals—Soviet Union—Biography. 4. Soviet Union. Raboche-Krest'ianskaia Krasnaia Armiia—Officers—Biography. 5. Soviet Union—History—1925–1953—Biography. 6. World War, 1939–1945—Soviet Union. 7. Military planning—Soviet Union—History. 8. Military art and science—Soviet Union—History. 9. Operational art (Military science)—History—20th century. 10. Offensive (Military science)—History—20th century. I. Title. DK268.I85H37 2010 940.54'1247092—dc22 [B] 2010004828 British Library cataloguing data are available ©2010 Richard W. Harrison. All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Front cover: Division Commander Isserson, ca. ¡939 (courtesy Russian State Military Archives); Soviet flag, Red Army pin ©20¡0 Shutterstock; background map shows the opposing sides’ plans for a strategic-level war game played by the Red Army high command in January ¡94¡ Manufactured in the United States of America McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640 www.mcfarlandpub.com For my son, Michael Acknowledgments I should like to express my thanks to a great number of people and institu- tions for the invaluable assistance they rendered me while researching and writing this book; had it not been for their help, this project would never have seen the light of day. I am particularly beholden to the late Irena Georgievna Yeremina (nee Isserson), whose reminiscences of her family were decisive in constructing a more nuanced portrait of her late father. Others include Col. Nikolai Mikhailovich Ramanichev and the late Col. Fedor Davydovich Sverdlov, who helped in track- ing down some of Isserson’s more obscure publications. Maj. Gen. Yurii Yakovle- vich Kirshin was also more than generous in recounting his various meetings with Isserson during the latter’s final years. I am also deeply in debt to Col. David M. Glantz (USA, Ret.), who throughout provided helpful advice. Among the various institutions I worked in, I would like to salute for particular praise the Archives of the Federal Security Service and the Russian State Military Archives, both in Mos- cow. The knowledgeable and courteous employees in these repositories were usu- ally able to satisfy my research needs with a minimum of red tape. The same is true of the State Public Historical Library of Russia and the Russian State Library, also in Moscow, where I spent many productive hours. I am also deeply in debt to the Military History Institute and the Central Armed Forces Museum, both in Moscow, where I conducted research several years ago. Thanks are also due to the Central Archives of the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation in Podol’sk. Likewise, I am grateful to the staff of the United States Army Military History Insti- tute in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, for generously allowing me to use their facilities, despite the fact that the subject of my research laid well outside its normal purview. Most of all, I am indebted to my wife, Yelena, for her technical support and infinite patience while this book was being written. vi Contents Acknowledgments . vi Note on Transliteration and Place Names . viii Foreword by David M. Glantz . 1 Preface . 3 1. Youth and Early Military Service . 7 2. Maturation . 28 3. The Deep Battle . 60 4. The Deep Operation . 90 5. The Deep Operation Revealed . 122 6. Peregrinations . 152 7. The Purge Years . 185 8. The Last Years of Freedom . 216 9. Descent into Hell . 247 10. Vindication . 273 11. The Prodigal’s Return . 304 12. Final Years . 336 Epilogue . 365 Chapter Notes . 367 Bibliography . 383 Index . 395 vii Note on Transliteration and Place Names No system of transliteration from the Cyrillic alphabet to English is perfect, and some are worse than others. For this work, I have adopted the transliteration method employed by the U.S. Library of Congress, with a few notable exceptions. The latter include those names (e.g., Maxim Gorky, Yalta, etc.), the spelling of which has become so thoroughly established that to change them would only con- fuse the reader. Others include those first and last names beginning with the Cyril- lic letter e and fl (e.g., Yegorov, Yevgenii, Yaroslavskii), as the system does not do justice to the actual pronunciation of these words. I have elected to transliterate them, respectively as Ye and Ya, which are closer in sound to the original. These same letters, when they appear elsewhere in a word, are translated according to the Library of Congress system. The correct spelling of place names presents a separate problem, particularly as many locales changed hands repeatedly during the years covered by this book, followed by a change in the city’s name. For such cases, I have adopted the method of introducing the city or town by the name commonly used at the time in the narrative, followed by its current name in parentheses; for example, Konigsberg (Kaliningrad). viii Foreword by David M. Glantz The appearance of Richard W. Harrison’s Architect of Soviet Victory in World War II: The Life and Theories of G. S. Isserson marks an important step forward in our understand- ing of the interwar Red Army. In fact, careful study of the military theoretician’s significant contributions to military thought applies not only to the Red and Soviet Armies, in gen- eral, but even to the nascent army of the current Russian Federation as well. For too long, we in the West have had to make do with accounts of this period often reflecting official points of view. Now, thanks to Harrison’s detailed study, we are provided with an in-depth look at the development of the army’s military theory through the works of one of its most brilliant thinkers—Colonel Georgii Samoilovich Isserson. For his efforts, Dr. Harrison has marshaled an impressive array of sources, the most significant of which are Isserson’s own theoretical works, both open and classified. These works, almost all of which are completely unknown in the West, reveal that, by the mid- dle of the 1930s, the Red Army possessed a sophisticated theory of waging war at the oper- ational level through the conduct of deep operations by exploiting operational maneuver, theories which, when finally implemented in wartime, would stand it is good stead during the bitter struggle with Hitler’s Nazi Germany. Unfortunately, the Soviet Union’s political leadership squandered this advantage in the military purges of 1937–38, forcing the army to relearn these basic principles later at a far more terrible price. And even though this skilled theorist was not fated to take part in World War II, the seeds he had sown among a gener- ation of student officers contributed to the eventual victory. Also highlighted here are Isserson’s equally important, although less well-known, con- tributions to the Red Army’s tactical development, as expressed in the theory of the deep battle. Especially revealing to the reader will be his account of the strategic and historical debates that roiled the army not only during the turbulent interwar years but also in the Cold War years after Stalin’s death in 1953. While the focus throughout remains the development of Isserson’s theoretical views, Harrison also devotes significant time and thought to examining the man behind the ideas— the new Soviet man—weaving this into the narrative in such a way to lighten the weighty analysis of profoundly important military thought. Here, the author presents a portrait of a brilliant but troubled man as he sought to advance his theories during a politically 1 2 Foreword by David M. Glantz treacherous time. Relying heavily on a variety of hitherto classified sources and interviews with those who knew and worked with Isserson, Harrison describes his subject’s military career and his often-difficult relations with fellow officers, colleagues, and friends. And while the author is unstinting in his admiration of Isserson’s contributions to military the- ory, he is no less relentless in revealing his monumental character flaws, which brought so much unhappiness to both him and those around him. In the ongoing struggle to piece together the tortured history of the Red Army, this book is a welcome addition to the growing body of post–Soviet work on the subject. While it restores Isserson to his rightful place among the panoply of important Russian military theorists such as Aleksandr Svechin, Vladimir Triandafillov, and Mikhail Tukhachevsky, it also provides an indispensable context for understanding not only how and why military theory and the armed forces developed in Soviet times but also in today’s Russian Federa- tion. Certain to be of interest even to the general reader, this book is a must read for those intent on understanding Soviet and Russian military thought. David M. Glantz • Carlisle, Pennsylvania David M. Glantz, a retired colonel in the U.S. Army and a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the Army’s Command and General Staff and War Col- leges, is the editor of the Journal of Slavic Military Studies and the author of many books and articles on the Soviet army in peace and war.