Stalin’s “war think tank” on the eve of war, 1939 - 1941 (the theoretical and practical aspects of quantitative research in alternative history)

The article continues the author’s exploration of the history of the pre-war period, 1939-1941, using the “alternative history” methodology. In a previous article, he established that this period was marked by five distinct situations each of which offered the possibility of taking alternative decisions that might have prevented the catastrophic outbreak of war in 1941.The purpose of the present article is to search for indications that the possibility of alternative decisions should, at least, be considered within the chronological boundaries of the five situations in the pre-invasion period. The extremely limited source base, however, presents a serious obstacle to realizing this goal. The decision-making process of the highest Soviet military-political leadership is poorly reflected in the sources and, consequently, has not been assimilated into contemporary historiography. For this reason, the author employed a methodology for analyzing quantitative data contained in the published records of visitors to Stalin’s Kremlin office, and the agendas of meetings of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. This data was then correlated with the protocols of decisions and materials of the so-called “special folders” of Politburo decisions stored in the archives (RGASPI, RGANI). This made it possible to examine the decision-making process of the Stalinist leadership, while at the same time the analysis of quantitative data enabled an investigation of its dynamics and nature. The author was able to establish that a relatively small group of military men and politicians took part in making the most important defense decisions, a group the author defines as Stalin’s “war think tank.” He found that the activities of this “war think tank” between 1939 and 1941 were very sporadic in nature, and that the dynamics of its meetings were characterized by constant up and down fluctuations where a succession of frequent and well-attended meetings were followed by periods of a clear drop off in attention to military issues. The author also proved the absence of a direct relationship between the periods of activity of Stalin’s “war think tank” and the key events that defined the pre-war situations: the signing of a treaty with Germany in 1939, the end of the “Winter War” with Finland in March 1940, and the failure of negotiations in Berlin in November 1940. Two important findings resulted from this study. First, it identified a discrepancy between the dynamics of meetings in Stalin’s office and the decision-making of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. Second, it revealed a striking discrepancy between the significance of the issues discussed by the “war think tank” and the composition of the participants in its meetings. This, in turn, provides a basis to discuss the existence of a special model for Stalin’s military decision-making, one characterized by strictly limited functions, interactions, and horizontal connections. As a result, the ability of Stalin’s “war think tank” to assess the situation on the eve and beginning of World War II as a set of alternatives for preventing the catastrophe of 1941 turned out to be fatally limited.