10 July 1941

14:00

Kiev. To Khrushchev

1) Your proposals concerning the destruction of all property contradict the guidelines set forth in Comrade Stalin’s speech, where the destruction of all valuable property was discussed in connection with the forced withdrawal of Red Army units. Your proposals, however, envisage the immediate destruction of all valuable property, grain, and livestock within a zone 100–150 kilometers from the enemy, regardless of the state of the front.

Such a measure could demoralize the population, provoke discontent with Soviet authority, disrupt the rear of the Red Army, and create, both in the army and among the population, a mood of obligatory retreat instead of a determination to repulse the enemy.

2) The State Defense Committee obliges you, in view of the withdrawal of troops and only in the event of withdrawal, within a 70-verst zone from the front, to evacuate the entire adult male population, draft livestock, grain, tractors, combine harvesters, and move them under their own power to the east; and what cannot be evacuated, destroy, without, however, touching poultry, small livestock, and other foodstuffs necessary for the remaining population. As for distributing all this property to the troops, we decisively object to this, since the troops could turn into bands of marauders.

3) Do not blow up power stations, but remove all those valuable parts without which the stations cannot operate, so that the power stations cannot function for a long time.

4) Do not blow up water pipelines.

5) Do not blow up factories, but remove from the equipment all necessary valuable parts, machine tools, etc., so that the factories cannot be restored for a long time.

6) After the withdrawal of our units to the left bank of the Dnieper, blow up all bridges thoroughly.

7) Warehouses, especially artillery ones, must be evacuated without fail, and what cannot be evacuated, blow up.

8) As for the evacuation of factories beyond the 70-verst zone, where there is as yet no direct threat from the enemy, carry out this evacuation in advance, removing primarily machine tools and other most valuable equipment.

Chairman of the State

Defense Committee

I. STALIN

Source. 1995. No. 2