Throughout 1943, as the German Army stalled and took on massive losses in Soviet territory, Red Army troops were able to eventually push them back and, in the wake of the battles, were rightly embraced as liberators of the inhabitants of those territories the Nazis had been occupying. Soldiers and citizens alike, unsurprisingly, had many questions. For the beleaguered villagers, Russian troops made inquiries that were relatively easy to answer: How were you treated by the Germans? How many of the village’s citizens were killed or wounded? Did you personally participate in or see others engaged in collaborating with the enemy?
The soldiers, on the other hand, were pelted with questions that weren’t as easy to answer, certainly not from their sphere of influence, nor that of their immediate superiors. The questions were collected and sent to Moscow, not because there was hope of getting the answers back to these survivors, but because someone thought it would be an excellent opportunity for the Kremlin to understand what was on the mind of their countrymen who had lived through their own hell.
Communist Party officials and Soviet philosophers Georgiy Aleksandrov and Mikhail Iovchuk gathered a long list of the questions being raised by the villagers as Red Army troops pushed the Germans out of Russian and Ukrainian territories. Their thought was to forward them to Andrey Zhdanov, the USSR’s preeminent “cultural policy advisor” for possible study and exploitation. The questions had already been forwarded to “members of the propaganda groups of the Propaganda Office” and, on 19 December 1943, were being sent along by Aleksandrov and Iovchuk, in four general groups, to Zhdanov in his position as Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) [TsK VKP(b)].
The document comes from the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History [RGASPI], and its translation follows.
19 December 1943
TO THE SECRETARY OF THE TsK VKP(b) Comrade A. A. ZHDANOV
We feel it necessary to inform you about questions asked in December 1943 to the members of the propaganda groups of the Propaganda Office by the population of liberated districts Stavropol, Krasnodar Krai, Kyiv, Kharkiv, Stalin, Sumy, Poltava, and Chernihiv Oblasts of the Ukrainian SSR, and the Kalinin, Oryol, Smolensk, Kursk, Rostov, and Stalingrad Oblasts.
I. On the military posture of the USSR
1. Will the Red Army be heading to the West after liberating their territories, and will we then continue the war?
2. Why are Red Army losses not being reported in the Sovinformburo releases?
3. How is the Red Army being fed?
4. What is the equipment balance between the German and Soviet armies?
5. What are the offensive capabilities of the German army?
6. When will the war end?
7. Isn’t the Germans’ retreat a trap for us, since Germany is a very strong country?
8. Will the nature of the war change when we rid our territory of the Germans and enter German territory?
9. How are we to understand Comrade Stalin’s position that the Soviet Union will emerge from the war even stronger?
10. Won’t we be losing Western Ukraine, Belarus, and the Baltics?
11. Will the Germans wage chemical warfare?
12. Isn’t the introduction of the “Order of Bohdan Khmelnytskyi” a well-known preparation of public opinion for war with Poland?
13. Why are trenches being dug on the right bank of the Dnieper when the Red Army is advancing to the West?
14. Why is there no mention of Comrades Budennyy and Vorishilov in the press?
15. Why are such poorly trained Red Army soldiers being sent into combat? Is our military so small?
16. Why is the Red Army taking so few spoils of war these days?
17. Will the Red Army liberate Poland?
18. What is the mood of the people in Western Belarus, Ukraine, and the Baltics? Are they awaiting our Red Army?
19. Are there a lot of citizens of the Baltic Republics fighting against the Red Army?
20. Do we have special units made up of Latvian, Lithuanian, and Estonian citizens?
II. On the Soviet rear area
1. Is it true that Moscow is protected by the “Chicago planipo” (American cannon), so the Germans can’t bomb the capital?
2. Is it true that a device has been invented that, using electric waves, shrinks German planes, and that’s why Moscow is not being bombed?
3. Do young people in Moscow dance the foxtrot and tango?
4. Is it true that evening ball gowns have been introduced for Moscow ladies?
5. What is our country finding the most difficult currently?
6. Why is our country setting up bread purchases at the present time?
7. Why do so many take bread from us?
8. Will bread purchases be offered? And when?
9. Will salt be provided?
10. Will people with many children receive benefits?
11. Will the collective farmers who suffered at the hands of the Germans receive cattle?
12. Will there be a purge of the party after the war, and will the communists who were in the occupied territory remain in the party?
13. Is it true that there will be free trade, and if true, then when?
14. Will evacuated factories be returned?
15. Why special rations are given to senior workers, but not to ordinary employees?
16. What labor laws were issued in our country during the war years?
17. Will the government assist the regions where the wheat crops failed?
18. Is it not possible to introduce bread cards for children of military personnel in these areas?
19. Why do people who were hired by the Germans continue to work in managerial rural and district work?
20. Some kulaks who returned during the occupation and received a home from the German leaders; why have they still not been evicted?
21. Will the collective farms in the liberated areas be restored?
22. Is the restoration of collective farms now mandatory?
23. What steps will be taken against those who, before the occupation of the region, did not work in the collective farm, lived on their own individual farms under the Germans, and now, with the reestablishment of collective farms, again under various pretexts do not want to work in the collective farm?
24. Why was land not given for individual gardens according to needs, when much of it was left untouched?
25. Who will use the gardens in the coming year, the old owners, or they will be handed over to new ones?
26. Is it true that garden lands will now be assigned to citizens for 7 years?
27. Will the plots be evened up, since some have five gardens, but others have one?
28. Is it true that those who worked for the Germans will be evicted to Siberia?
29. Why are schools teaching boys and girls separately?
30. Why do they give ration cards if the goods are unavailable?
31. Why is the bread now so bad?
32. Why aren’t prisoners of wars used for agricultural work?
33. Is the organization of the church affairs committee related to our relations with England and the USA?
34. How will anti-religious work among the population be carried out, especially in schools?
35. What’s being done about priests coming to the agitprop department of the party’s district committees for advice on how to conduct their work?
36. What is being done with the schools and clubs, which during the German occupation were occupied by churches and prayer houses?
37. Will state funds be released for the construction of new churches? How will the priests be trained?
38. How will international education now be implemented in the schools?
39. Why are we not given bread, but the German prisoners of war are?
40. Will the Red Army units return the lumber that had been prepared for the construction of huts and was later taken to construct the bridge across the Dnieper?
41. Will our allies help us restore the economy?
42. Is it true that they’re starving in the Urals and Siberia?
43. Is it true that we have leased Baku and Groznyy to the English for 99 years?
44. Is it true that after the war we will be working for England and the USA for five years?
45. Where did the Kalmyks come from, and why are they such beasts?
46. Why don’t the newspapers write about Vlasov’s supporters?
47. What’s going to be done about the Vlasov traitors?
48. What will be done with the men who remained in the occupied territory?
49. Is it true that policemen are being sent to the front line?
50. Will former policemen who distinguished themselves at the front be awarded Medals of the Soviet Union?
51. Will the families of former policemen be expelled from villages?
52. What will be done with the children of former policemen who have become orphans?
53. What is to be done with houses that were built by people who worked for the Germans?
54. What is going to be done with those who voluntarily left to work in Germany?
55. How will the women be treated whose husbands are in the Red Army but who married Germans during the occupation?
56. What will be done with those women who, of their own volition, married Germans?
57. Will women who have children from Germans be considered childless, and will they be taxed accordingly?
58. If a Russian woman has a baby from a German, what is the child’s nationality?
59. Why were churches permitted to be opened during the war?
60. Why, during the period of collectivization and later, did the Soviet government allow great restrictions on religion – churches were closed and destroyed – was this overreach on the part of the Soviet government?
61. Is it possible to hire priests from active believers who do not have a spiritual education?
62. Is it possible to restore and celebrate our national holidays, such as Maslenitsa and others?
63. Is it possible to organize kolkhoz weddings?
64. Why is the government awarding the leaders of the Orthodox Church?
65. Will it be Soviet rule after the war, or will it be the same type of government as in America and England?
66. Will the USSR fall under the yoke of England and America in exchange for their assistance?
67. Will we have English shops after the war?
68. Is it true that the Soviet government awarded the Order of Lenin to the Archbishop of Canterbury?
69. How will the USSR guarantee its independence?
III. Regarding Nazi Germany
1. Are there lots of soldiers in the German army now?
2. What is the production of arms in Germany like now?
3. Who is helping the Germans replenishing their fuel?
4. How did Germany enter the Black Sea?
5. Is it true that the Germans destroyed the entire British navy?
6. What is the condition of the German troops in Crimea and their numerical strength?
7. Are the Germans conducting bacterial warfare?
8. Why was Nazi propaganda successful in Germany?
9. Is it possible to consider all the soldiers of Hitler’s army as animals or not?
10. How will the Germans pay for their destruction in our country?
11. Where does Germany get the funds to pay its debts, and what countries does it owe?
12. Will a bill be presented to Germany if the government there is the same as ours?
13. Will we be establishing a Soviet government in Germany?
14. Why is the German working class silent?
IV. On the USSR’s standing in the international community
1. Why is Japan, as a German ally, not at war with the USSR?
2. Are we going to assist our allies in the war against Japan, like they helped us in the war against Germany?
3. What is the position of Japan and Turkey after the Moscow Conference and Comrade Stalin’s address on November 6, 1943?
4. How did the court case of Pavlov and Kornilov end? And where are they now?
5. How did Turkey exercise control over the straits?
6. Will the Italian prisoners located in the Soviet Union be sent back over to Italy to fight the Germans?
7. What is the National Committee for a Free Germany?
8. How did the German workers react to its manifesto?
9. What work does this committee do? And how do our allies view it?
10. Will Italy answer for the destruction its soldiers caused in the Soviet Union?
11. Can Italy’s war against Germany be considered a just war?
12. What fate awaits Germany after it is defeated?
13. What role is the Vatican playing?
14. Could Turkey allow British and American ships into the Black Sea?
15. What are the prospects for Turkey’s participation in European affairs after the war, if it does not make a stand against Germany?
16. What are the relations between Turkey and Bulgaria?
17. Could the allies oppose us after Germany’s defeat?
18. Why isn’t the US fighting against Finland?
19. Can it happen that the Allies will not open a second front in 1944?
20. Why are the allied troops advancing so slowly in Italy?
21. Is there discord between the Soviet Union, England, and the US on the issue of the USSR’s western borders?
22. Why is the US fortifying its military bases in Alaska? Are they directed against the USSR?
23. Why is the English government tolerant of some governments in exile in London and hostile to the USSR?
24. Is the fact that we are not fighting the Japanese impacting our relations with the allies?
25. Why should we allow England into the Balkans if it is trying to establish its influence in Romania, Hungary, and Yugoslavia?
26. Will the post-war peace issues not be resolved without our equal participation?
27. What is Roosevelt’s authority among the various parties in terms of the upcoming US elections?
28. Will the USSR be able to get along peacefully with the capitalist countries after the defeat of Germany? How long can the Soviet Union be in a capitalist encirclement?
Source: RGASPI. F. 17. Op. 125. D. 242. L. 1-7.
Translation © 2025 by Michael Estes and TranslatingHistory.org
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