2025/07/17 by Yaacov Falkov · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Eastern European Communism and Reforms #European and Russian Geopolitical Military Strategies #Intelligence, Security, War Strategy
paper · doi:10.1080/16161262.2025.2535174
openalex publication_date 2025/07/17 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/15
In the summer of 1944, the Soviet strategic offensive Bagration launched in Belorussia led to the collapse of the German Army Group Center and brought the Red Army closer to the Third Reich’s territory. Among the enablers of this Soviet success, the historiography of World War II mentions Moscow’s ability to create a false image of the Red Army’s deployment and thereby mislead the Germans into believing that the main Soviet blow would come in Ukraine. This article, based on German and British intelligence reports, discusses the hypothesis that Soviet strategic intelligence was also involved in the deception effort that paved the way for Bagration. According to it, back in the spring of 1944, Soviet spies managed to convince Berlin of the growing general fatigue of the Red Army and its desire to concentrate its summer offensive on the southern, Ukrainian sector of the Eastern Front.