Party Leadership of the Partisan Movement during the Occupation of Smolensk Region by Nazi Troops (1941–1942)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of one of the most difficult, ambiguous and contradictory issues of the Great Patriotic War – the party leadership of the partisan movement in the Smolensk region in 1941–1942. Unfortunately, Soviet historiography used to evaluate the party leadership of the deployment of the guerrilla struggle exclusively in rosy tones, avoiding any critical assessments, which distorted the real picture of events. Party leadership and influence was a complex phenomenon. If at the level of ordinary party members heroism in the fight against the enemy, the personal qualities of real communists manifested themselves massively and everywhere, then confusion often reigned in regional party organizations, there was a lack of discipline. This was the result of serious failures in the leadership of the party members on the ground by the Smolensk Regional Committee of the CPSU (b). At the same time, after the occupation of the region, the regional committee had no systematic connection with district organizations and did not lead the partisan movement for five months. The situation began to change only after the defeat of the Nazis near Moscow. The turning point was the IX Plenum of the Smolensk Regional Committee of the CPSU (b) in April 1942, after which the systematic and active leadership of the underground district committees and the partisan movement in the Smolensk region began. But even then, in the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), in the NKVD, the partisans (many of whom were surrounded) were looked at suspiciously, with distrust. This can explain the enormous losses of the partisans in the summer and autumn of 1942. Thus, the thesis about the outstanding leadership role of the CPSU (b) in the deployment of the partisan movement is significantly embellished and does not correspond to reality.