Stalin by Simon Sebag Montefiore

Author:Simon Sebag Montefiore
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: non.fiction, biography, history
ISBN: 9780307427939
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2007-12-17T13:00:00+00:00

Malenkov was always punctilious in his reports but even the meticulous Zhdanov was sometimes distracted by battle, provoking another reprimand: “It’s extremely strange that Comrade Zhdanov feels no need to come to the phone or to ask us for mutual advice at this dangerous time for Leningrad.” Independence was dangerous in Stalin’s eyes.

At 4 p.m., General Alexei Antonov, “young, very handsome, dark and lithe,” who became his trusted Chief of Operations, after Vasilevsky’s promotion, and after trying a series of officers all of whom were swiftly sacked, arrived with the next report. Antonov was a “peerlessly able general and a man of great culture and charm,” wrote Zhukov. Stalin was a stickler for accurate reporting and would, recalled Shtemenko, “not tolerate the slightest . . . embellishment.” Antonov handled him deftly: always calm, “a master at assessing the situation,” he graded the urgency of his files by colour and “knew when to say, ‘Give me the green folder.’ ” Then Stalin smilingly replied: “Well now, let’s look at your ‘green file.’ ”

In the early evening, Stalin arrived in the Kremlin in his convoy of speeding Packards or else walked downstairs from his flat to the Little Corner where the “cosy” anteroom, with its comfortable armchairs, strictly policed by Poskrebyshev, was already full. Visitors found themselves in a world of control, sparseness and cleanliness. There was nothing unnecessary anywhere. Everyone had shown their papers repeatedly and been searched for weapons. Even Zhukov had to surrender his pistol. “The inspection was repeated over and over again.” Poskrebyshev, now in NKVD General’s uniform, greeted them at his desk. They waited in silence though regulars greeted one another before falling quiet. It was tense. Those who had never met Stalin before were full of anticipation but as one colonel recalled, “I noticed that those . . . not here for the first time, were considerably more perturbed than those . . . here for the first time.”

At around 8 p.m., when Stalin arrived, a murmur passed through the room. He said nothing, but nodded at some. The colonel noticed “my neighbour wiped drops of sweat from his brow and dried his hands on a handkerchief.” A small room, a cubbyhole, contained the last bodyguards at a desk before the office. Stalin entered that “bright spacious room,” with its long green table. At the other end of the room was his desk, on which there was always a heap of documents in their papki , a broad-frequency telephone, a line of different-coloured telephones, a pile of sharpened pencils. Behind the desk, there was a door that led to Stalin’s own lavatory and the signal room which contained easy chairs, all the Baudot and telegraph equipment to connect Stalin to the fronts, and the famous globe at which he had discussed Operation Torch with Churchill.

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