The Arduous Beginning

Few men are better equipped than Marshal A. Eremenko, successively Commander of the Soviet Western and Bryansk Fronts and the Fourth Shock Army, to relate the story of the early months of resistance to the sudden and treacherous Nazi assault on the Soviet Union in 1941. The facts compiled between these covers were drawn by the author from his own wartime experiences, from war histories and archives, and the eyewitness accounts of other war veterans. The book tells the story of Soviet resistance in the central sector of the Soviet-German war front, notably at Mogilev and Smolensk, between July 1941 and February 1942. The author pays eloquent tribute to the devotion and prowess of the Soviet soldier, who fought tenaciously against overwhelming odds to stem the Nazi avalanche. He restores the truth and justice in respect to the brave Soviet generals whose good name was licentiously besmirched at the time of the Stalin cult. A special section in the book deals with hitherto unpublished facts about Soviet defense preparations on the eve of the Nazi attack.