Speech at the Solemn Session of the Moscow Soviet on the 24th Anniversary of the October Revolution, 6 November 1941

STALIN SPEAKS TO THE WORLD1

Twenty-four years have elapsed since the October Socialist Revolution triumphed and the Soviet system was established in our country. We are now standing on the threshold of the twenty-fifth year of existence of the Soviet system.

Usually at the festive sessions of the anniversary of the October Revolution the results of our successes in the field of peaceful construction for the past year are summed up. We really have the possibility of summing up such results, since our achievements in the field of peaceful construction are growing not only from year to year, but from month to month. Both friends as well as enemies are aware of what kind of achievements these are and their extent. The past year was not a year of peaceful construction alone. It was at the same time a year of war against the German invaders, who perfidiously attacked our peace-loving country. It was only during the first six months of the past year that we were able to continue our peaceful construction. The second half of the year, over four months, is proceeding in conditions of fierce war against the German imperialists. The war has thus become the turning point in the development of our country for the past year. The war has considerably curtailed and in some cases completely stopped our peaceful construction. It compels our whole work to be reorganized on a war footing. It has transformed our country into a single, all-embracing rear serving the front, serving our Red Army, our Red Navy.

The period of peaceful construction has ended. The period of the liberation war against the German invaders has begun.

It is quite in place, therefore, to raise the question of the results of the war for the second half of the year, or, to be precise, for more than four months of the second half of the year, and the task we are setting ourselves in this liberation war. I already stated in one of my speeches at the beginning of the war that the war had created a serious danger for our country, that a serious danger was facing our country, that it was necessary to understand and realize this danger and reorganize our whole work on a war footing.

Today, as a result of four months of war, I must emphasize that this danger—far from diminishing—has on the contrary increased. The enemy has captured the greater part of the Ukraine, Byelorussia, Moldavia and Estonia, and a number of other regions, has penetrated the Donbas, is looming like a black cloud over Leningrad, and is menacing our glorious capital, Moscow.

The German fascist invaders are plundering our country, destroying the cities and villages built by the labor of the workers, peasants and intelligentsia. The Hitler hordes are killing and violating the peaceful inhabitants of our country without sparing women, children or the aged.

Our brothers in the regions of our country captured by the Germans are groaning under the yoke of the German oppressors.

Defending the honor and freedom of the country, courageously repelling the attacks of the brutal enemy, setting examples of valor and heroism, the fighters of our army and navy have compelled the enemy to shed streams of blood.

But the enemy does not stop before sacrifices; he has not even an iota of regard for the blood of his soldiers, he is hurling ever new detachments on to the front to replace the disabled troops and is straining all his strength to capture Leningrad and Moscow before the winter sets in, for he knows that the winter holds nothing good in store for him. In four months of the war we lost 350,000 killed, 378,000 missing, and have 1,020,000 wounded men. In the same period the enemy lost over 4,500,000 killed, wounded and prisoners.

There can be no doubt that as a result of four months of the war, Germany, whose manpower reserves are already becoming exhausted, has been considerably more weakened by the war than the Soviet Union, whose reserves are only now unfolding to their full extent.

Launching their attack on our country, the German fascist invaders expected that they would surely be able to "finish” with the Soviet Union in one and a half to two months and would be able to reach the Urals within a short time.

It must be stated that the Germans did not conceal this plan for a "lightning” victory. On the contrary, they advertised it in every way. Facts, however, show how lightminded and groundless the “Blitzkrieg” plan was. It must now be considered that this mad plan has utterly failed.

How can it be explained that the "Blitzkrieg” which succeeded in Western Europe did not succeed but collapsed in the east? On what were the German fascist strategists calculating when they asserted that within two months they would finish with the Soviet Union and within this brief period reach the Urals?

They calculated primarily on the fact that they seriously hoped to create a universal coalition against the U.S.S.R., to draw Great Britain and the United States into this coalition and, preliminary to that, to frighten the ruling circles of these countries by the specter of revolution, and in this way completely to isolate our country from the other powers.

The Germans knew that their policy of playing up the contradictions between classes in separate states and between these states and the Soviet country had already yielded results in France whose rulers, permitting themselves to be intimidated by the specter of revolution, in their fear placed their country at Hitler’s feet and gave up resistance. The German fascist strategists thought that the same would happen in the case of Great Britain and the United States. The not-unknown Hess was actually sent to England by the German fascists to convince the British politicians to join the universal campaign against the U.S.S.R.

But the Germans gravely miscalculated. In spite of Hess’s efforts, Great Britain and the United States not only have not joined the campaign of the German fascist invaders against the U.S.S.R.; on the contrary, they are in one camp with the U.S.S.R. against Hitler Germany. The U.S.S.R. proved not only that it was not isolated; on the contrary, it acquired new allies in Great Britain, the United States and other countries occupied by the Germans.

It turned out that the German policy of playing up contradictions and intimidating by the specter of revolution has exhausted itself and no longer fits in the new situation. And not only does not fit, but is moreover pregnant with great dangers for the German invaders, for, in the new conditions of war, it leads to exactly the opposite result. The Germans calculated, in the second place, on the instability of the Soviet system, the instability of the Soviet rear, in the belief that the very first serious blow and the first setbacks of the Red Army would give rise to conflicts between workers and peasants, to feuds between the peoples of the U.S.S.R., that this would be followed by uprisings and that the country would fall apart, which would make easier the advance of the German invaders as far as the Urals.

But here, too, the Germans gravely miscalculated. Far from weakening, the setbacks of the Red Army, on the contrary, strengthened still more the alliance of the workers and peasants as well as the friendship of the peoples of the U.S.S.R.

More than that, they transformed the family of the peoples of the U.S.S.R. into a single, inviolable camp which selflessly is supporting its Red Army and Red Navy. The Soviet rear was never as strong as today. It is quite credible that with such losses as we have today, any other state would fail to withstand the ordeals and would deteriorate. If the Soviet system was able so easily to withstand the ordeal and still further to strengthen its rear, this means that the Soviet system is now the strongest system. Finally, the German invaders calculated on the weakness of the Red Army and Red Navy, believing that with the very first blow of the German army and German navy they would scatter our army and navy and open the road for themselves for an unhampered advance into the interior of our country. But here, too, the Germans gravely miscalculated, overestimating their own forces and underestimating our army and navy. Of course, our army and our navy are still young; they have been fighting a mere four months; they have not yet had time to become professional in the full sense, while they are faced by the professional navy and professional army of the Germans, which have already been waging war for two years.

But, firstly, the morale of our army is higher than that of the German, for our army is defending its country against foreign invaders and believes in the justice of its cause, whereas the German army is waging a war of conquest and is plundering a foreign country without the possibility for even one minute of believing in the justice of their base cause. There can be no doubt that the idea of defense of one’s country, for the sake of which our people are fighting, must produce and is actually producing in our army heroes who are cementing the Red Army, whereas the idea of seizure and plunder of a foreign country, for the sake of which the Germans are actually waging war, must give rise and actually is giving rise in the German army to professional robbers deprived of any moral principles and the deterioration of the German army.

Secondly, advancing inland into our country, the German army is getting far away from the German rear, is compelled to act in hostile surroundings, is compelled to create a new rear in a foreign country, which, moreover, is being undermined by our partisans, who are utterly disorganizing the supplies to the German army. This compels it to fear its own rear and kills its faith in the firmness of its position, at a time when our army, operating in its native surroundings, enjoys the uninterrupted support of its rear, is ensured of its supply of manpower, munitions and foodstuffs and is firmly confident in its rear.

That is why our army has turned out to be stronger than the Germans expected, and the German army weaker than could have been supposed judging from the boastful publicity of the German invaders.

The defense of Leningrad and Moscow, where our divisions recently annihilated some three dozen professional German divisions, shows that the new Soviet men, commanders, pilots, artillerymen, mine-throwers, tankmen, infantrymen and marines are being and already have been forged in the fire of the patriotic war and tomorrow will be the terror of the German army.

No doubt, all these circumstances taken together, predetermined the inevitability of the collapse of the "Blitzkrieg” in the east.

All this, of course, is true, but it is also true that along with these favorable conditions the Red Army has also to contend with a number of unfavorable conditions, through whose force our army, suffering temporary setbacks, has been compelled to retreat, compelled to yield a number of regions of our country to the enemy.

What are these unfavorable conditions? Wherein lie the reasons for the temporary military setbacks of the Red Army?

One of the reasons for the setbacks of the Red Army consists in the absence of a second front in Europe against the German fascist troops. It is a fact that there are no armies of Great Britain or the United States on the European continent at present which are waging war against the German fascist troops, in view of which the Germans do not have to divide their forces and fight on two fronts in the west and east. And this fact brings about a situation where the Germans, considering their rear in the west secure, have the possibility of marching their troops and the armies of their allies in Europe against our country.

The situation now is such that our country is waging the liberation war alone without anyone’s military aid, against the combined forces of the Germans, Finns, Rumanians, Italians and Hungarians.

The Germans are bragging about their temporary successes, lavishing endless praises on their army, asserting that it is able to overcome the Red Army in battles all alone. But the German assertions are empty boasting, for is it not clear why in such a case, the Germans have resorted to the aid of the Finns, Rumanians, and Italians against the Red Army, which is fighting exclusively with its own forces without military aid from anyone? There is no doubt that the absence of a second front against the Germans in Europe renders the position of the German army considerably easier.

But neither can there be any doubt that the appearance of a second front on the continent of Europe—and it must appear in the nearest future—will render substantially easier the position of the Red Army to the detriment of the German army. Another reason for the temporary setbacks of our army consists in the shortage of tanks and partly also of aircraft. In modern warfare it is very difficult for the infantry to fight without tanks and without adequate protection from the air. With regard to quality, our air force is superior to the German and our glorious pilots have covered themselves with the fame of dauntless fighters, but we still have fewer planes than the Germans. The quality of our tanks is superior to that of the German tanks and our glorious tankmen and artillery men have time and again put to flight the lauded German troops with their numerous tanks. Nevertheless, we have several times fewer tanks than the Germans. Herein lies the secret of the temporary successes of the German army.

One cannot say that our tank industry is working badly or is poorly supplying our front with tanks. No, it is working very well and producing no small number of splendid tanks. But the Germans are producing a far greater number of tanks because they now have at their disposal not only their own tank industry but also the industries of Czechoslovakia, Belgium, Holland and France. Were it not for this fact, the Red Army would have long ago smashed the German army, which never goes into battle without tanks and cannot withstand the blows of our units unless it has superiority in tanks.

There is only one means necessary to reduce the German superiority in tanks to naught and thereby radically to change the position of both armies.

This consists not only in achieving a several-fold increase in the tank production in our country, but also in achieving a sharp increase in production of anti-tank rifles and guns, anti-tank grenades and mine-throwers, in building more anti-tank pits and all sorts of other anti-tank obstacles. This constitutes the task at present. We can fulfill this task and we must fulfill it at any cost.

In our country the German invaders, that is the Hitlerites, are usually referred to as fascists. The Hitlerites, it turns out, consider this incorrect and persist in calling themselves "National-Socialists.” Consequently, the Germans want to convince us that the party of the Hitlerites, the party of the German invaders, which is robbing Europe and which has organized the villainous attack on our socialist state, is a socialist party. Is this possible? Can there be anything in common between socialism and the brutal Hitlerite invaders who are robbing and oppressing the peoples of Europe? Can the Hitlerites be considered nationalists? Actually, the Hitlerites today are not nationalists but imperialists. While the Hitlerites were uniting German lands and incorporating the Rhine region, Austria, etc., they could in a certain sense be considered nationalists. But after they captured foreign territories and enslaved European nations—the Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Norwegians, Danes, Dutch, Belgians, Frenchmen, Serbs, Greeks, Ukrainians, Byelorussians, and the Baltic peoples, etc. —and began to drive for world domination, the Hitler party ceased to be nationalist, for from that moment it became a party of imperialism, conquest and oppression.

The party of the Hitlerites is a party of imperialists, moreover, the most rapacious and plunderous imperialists among all the imperialists of the world. Can the Hitlerites be considered Socialists? No, they cannot. In fact, the Hitlerites are the avowed enemies of socialism, the bitterest reactionaries and blackguards who have deprived the working class and peoples of Europe of their elementary democratic liberties. To cover up their reactionary, blackguard essence, the Hitlerites are branding the Anglo-American internal regime as a plutocratic regime. But in England and the United States there are elementary democratic liberties, there are trade unions of workers and employees, there are labor parties, there is a Parliament, whereas the Hitler regime has abolished all these institutions in Germany.

It is sufficient to compare these two series of facts to understand the reactionary essence of the Hitler regime and the full falseness of the chatter of the German fascists about the Anglo-American plutocratic regime.

Actually the Hitler regime is a counterpart of the reactionary regime which existed in Russia under tsarism. It is known that the Hitlerites today as readily violate the rights of the workers, the rights of the intelligentsia, the rights of the peoples, as these were violated by the tsarist regime; that they today as readily organize medieval Jewish pogroms as they were organized by the tsarist regime.

The Hitler party is a party of the enemies of democratic liberties, a party of medieval reaction and blackguard pogroms. And if these brazen imperialists and most bitter reactionaries still continue to parade in the cloak of “nationalists” and “Socialists,” they are doing it in order to deceive the people, befuddle simpletons and cover their robber imperialism in essence with the flag of “nationalism” and “socialism.” The crow is donning peacock feathers—but, however much crows adorn themselves with peacock feathers, they cannot cease to be crows.

"We must strive by any means,” Hitler said, "to have the world conquered by Germans. If we want to create our great German empire, we must above all force out and exterminate the Slav peoples, the Russians, Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Bulgarians, Ukrainians and Byelorussians. There are no reasons to prevent us from doing this.” “Man,” says Hitler, "is sinful from the moment of his birth and can be ruled only by force. Any methods are permissible in treating him. When politics requires it, it is necessary to lie, betray and even kill.”

"Kill everyone who is against us,” Goering says, “Kill and kill again; I and not you bear responsibility for it, therefore kill!”

“I am freeing man from the degrading chimera called conscience,” says Hitler. “Conscience, like education, cripples man. I have the advantage of not being deterred by any considerations of theoretical or moral order.”

One of the orders of the German command to the 459th Regiment, dated September 25 and found on a dead German, reads as follows: "I order firing at every Russian as soon as he appears within six hundred meters distance. The Russian must know that he is faced with a resolute enemy from whom he cannot expect any lenience.”

One of the appeals of the German command to the soldiers, found on dead Lieutenant Gustav Ziegal. a native of Frankfurt-on-Main, reads: “You have neither heart nor nerves; they are not needed in war. Free yourselves from feelings of compassion and sympathy— kill every Russian, every Soviet person. Don’t stop, whether you have an old man, a woman, a girl or a boy before you—kill. Thereby you will save yourselves from death, secure the future of your family and win eternal glory.”

There you have the program and directives of the leaders of the Hitlerite party and Hitlerite command, the program and directives of people who have lost every vestige of human beings and are degraded to the level of wild beasts. And these people, deprived of conscience and honor, people with the morals of beasts, have the audacity to call for the annihilation of the great Russian nation, the nation of Plekhanov and Lenin, Belinsky and Chernyshevsky, Pushkin and Tolstoy, Glinka and Tchaikovsky, Gorky and Chekhov, Sechenov and Pavlov, Repin and Surikov, Suvorov and Kutuzov!

The German invaders want a war of extermination against the peoples of the U.S.S.R. Well, if the Germans want a war of extermination, they shall have it.

Henceforth our task, the task of the peoples of the U.S.S.R., the task of the men, commanders and political workers of our army and our navy, consists in annihilating to the last man all Germans who penetrated the territory of our country as its occupationists. No mercy to the German occupationists! Death to the German occupationists! The rout of the German imperialists and their armies is inevitable. The fact alone that in their moral degradation the German invaders, having lost the human aspect, have already sunk to the level of wild beasts—this fact alone shows that they have doomed themselves to inevitable death.

But the inevitable death of the Hitler invaders and their armies is determined not by moral factors alone.

There are three other basic factors whose force is growing from day to day and which must in the near future lead to the inevitable rout of the Hitler robber imperialists. These are, firstly, the instability of the European rear of imperialist Germany, the instability of the "new order” in Europe. The German invaders have enslaved the peoples of the European continent from France to the Soviet Baltic, from Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Holland and Soviet Byelorussia to the Balkans and the Soviet Ukraine, have deprived them of their elementary democratic liberties, deprived them of the right to control their own destiny, deprived them of grain, meat and raw materials, converted them into their slaves, crucified the Poles, Czechs and Serbs and decided that by achieving the domination of Europe they would be able to build Germany’s world domination on this basis. That is what they call the "new order in Europe.”

But what is this “basis,” what is this "new order”? Only the Hitlerite self-adulating fools fail to see that the "new order” in Europe and the notorious “basis" of this order constitute a volcano ready to erupt at any moment and bury the German imperialist house of cards. Some refer to Napoleon, asserting that Hitler is acting like Napoleon and that he has every resemblance to Napoleon. But, firstly, Napoleon’s fate must not be forgotten. Secondly, Hitler no more resembles Napoleon than a kitten resembles a lion, for Napoleon fought against the forces of reaction and was supported by progressive forces, and Hitler, on the contrary, is supported by reactionary forces, is waging a struggle against the progressive forces.

Only the Hitlerite fools from Berlin can fail to understand that the enslaved peoples of Europe will fight and will rise against Hitler tyranny. Who can doubt that the U.S.S.R., Great Britain and the United States will render full aid to the peoples of Europe in their liberation struggle against Hitler tyranny?

Secondly, the instability of the German rear of the Hitlerite invaders. While the Hitlerites were uniting Germany, dismembered under the Versailles Treaty, they could have the support of the German people, inspired by the idea of the restoration of Germany. But after this task was solved and the Hitlerites took to the path of imperialism, to the path of seizure of foreign lands and conquest of foreign peoples, having converted the peoples of Europe and the peoples of the U.S.S.R. into avowed enemies of present-day Germany, the German people have taken the profound turn of opposing the war and are in favor of liquidation of the war.

More than two years of bloody war, the end of which is not in sight; millions of human victims, hunger, pauperization, epidemics, the hostile atmosphere surrounding the Germans, Hitler's stupid policy which transformed the peoples of the U.S.S.R. into avowed enemies of present-day Germany—all this could not but turn the German people against the needless and ruinous war.

Only Hitlerite fools can fail to understand that not only the European rear but also the German rear of the German troops represent a volcano ready to erupt and bury the Hitler adventurists.

And finally there is the coalition of the U.S.S.R., Great Britain and the United States against the German fascist imperialists. It is a fact that Great Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union have united into a single camp which has set itself the task of crushing the Hitler imperialists and their armies of conquest. The present war is a war of motors. He who will have the overwhelming superiority in the production of motors will win the war. If we combine the output of the motors of the United States, Great Britain and the U.S.S.R. we will have a superiority in motors of at least three to one as compared with Germany. Herein lies one of the bases of the inevitable doom of Hitler’s robber imperialism.

The recent three-power conference in Moscow with the participation of the representative of Great Britain, Mr. Beaverbrook and of the representative of the United States, Mr. Harriman, decided systematically to assist our country with tanks and aircraft. As is known, we already have begun to receive tanks and planes on the basis of this decision.

Still earlier, Great Britain ensured the supply to our country of such needed materials as aluminum, lead, tin, nickel and rubber.

If to this is added the fact that recently the United States decided to grant a $1,000,000,000 loan to the Soviet Union, it can be confidently said that the coalition of the United States, Great Britain and the U.S.S.R. is a real thing which is growing and which will continue to grow for the benefit of our common cause of liberation. Such are the factors determining the inevitable death of German-fascist imperialism. Lenin distinguished between two kinds of wars—wars of conquest, and consequently unjust wars, and wars of liberation—just wars. The Germans are now waging a war of conquest—an unjust war with the object of seizure of foreign territory and the subjugation of foreign peoples. Therefore all honest people must rise up against the German invaders as against enemies. Unlike Hitler Germany, the Soviet Union and its allies are waging a war for the liberation of the enslaved peoples of Europe and the U.S.S.R. from Hitler tyranny. Therefore, all honest people must support the armies of the U.S.S.R., Great Britain and the other allies, as armies of liberation.

We have not and cannot have such war aims as the seizure of foreign territories, the subjugation of foreign peoples, regardless of whether it concerns peoples and territories of Europe or peoples and territories of Asia, including Iran. Our first aim consists in liberating our territory and our peoples from the German fascist yoke.

We have not and cannot have such war aims as imposing our will and our regime on the Slavs and other enslaved peoples of Europe who are awaiting our aid. Our aid consists in assisting these people in their liberation struggle against Hitler tyranny and then setting them free to rule on their own land as they desire. No intervention whatever in the internal affairs of other peoples!

But to realize these aims it is necessary to crush the military might of the German invaders; it is necessary to annihilate to a man all the German occupationists who penetrated our country in order to enslave it.

But for this it is necessary that our army and our navy should have the active, energetic support of our whole country, that our workers and employees, men and women, should work ceaselessly at the enterprises and should produce ever more tanks, anti-tank guns, planes, cannon, mine-throwers, machine guns, rifles and munitions for the front, that our collective farmers, men and women, should work tirelessly in their fields producing ever greater quantities of grain, and meat for the front and for the country and raw materials for industry, that our whole country and all peoples of the U.S.S.R. should organize into a single war camp which together with our army and navy would wage a great liberation war for the honor and freedom of our country, for routing the German armies. This constitutes the task at present. We can and must carry out this task. Only by carrying out this task and crushing the German invaders can we achieve a lasting, just peace.

For the complete rout of the German invaders!

For the liberation of all oppressed peoples groaning under the yoke of Hitler tyranny!

Long live the inviolable friendship of the peoples of the Soviet Union! Long live our Red Army and Navy!

Long live our glorious country!

Our cause is just; victory will be ours!

November, 1941