The Rise of the Third Reich

The first secretary of the Adjara Autonomous Republic (equivalent to a state) under the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic of the Soviet Union and the W secretary of Batumi City is named Yefimov Petrovich Serov.

He was actually an old acquaintance of Hessmann. After the Russian August Revolution, he worked as a groom for Hessman, whose pseudonym was "Antonov", for a while. Later, he was assigned by the organization to work in the Russian-German Economic Promotion Company. Later, he was sent to Batumi on the coast of the Black Sea to participate in the construction of the oil city. He is now the First Secretary of the Autonomous Republic of Adjara and Secretary W of Batumi City.

For an old comrade who joined the Bolshevik Party before the February Revolution, and who has never been arrested by the NKVD, he has only reached the level of Secretary of the State Committee of the Union Republic, and his official career is not really considered. good. However, he is very satisfied with his current situation. A "state party secretary" is not enough compared to the previous ones, but it is still more than enough... Many comrades who participated in the revolution at the same time as him have mostly lost their families, but he has Living happily with his beloved wife and son, or being the earth tsar of the rich land of the Adjara Autonomous Republic, what else is there to be dissatisfied about?

Think about it a few years ago when Comrade Beria was the First Secretary of the Georgian Bolshevik Party, 425 of the 664 delegates to the Georgian Party Congress were arrested. Here in Georgia, the old Bolsheviks who were the contemporaries of Serov were almost wiped out. Light! And Serov was always prepared to be arrested in those days. Every day he would be reluctant to say goodbye to his wife Ye Lian. She was a rare beauty. When I thought about it, she might also end up in Siberia or elsewhere. After spending the rest of his life in a labor camp, Serov felt very sorry for his wife, who was nearly 15 years younger than him...

Of course, Serov doesn't feel innocent. He is really guilty and he has failed the party and the people. When he was working in the foreign trade system, he accepted gifts from German capitalists many times (this was all the fault of Hessmann's Jewish comprador Gusinski), and he also lived a corrupt and degenerate life in Riga for a period of time!

So shortly after the Georgian Purge began, in order to alleviate his sins (he believed that his sins must have been exposed), he took the initiative to write a confession to Beria, and by the way, he also exposed another person who was as corrupt as him. Natalie Leshinskaya, a senior cadre of the foreign trade system.

This woman was even more greedy than him. She accepted gifts in Riga, spent money lavishly, and even used her position to go to Paris and London to spend money. Of course, he didn't know that Natalie Lesinskaya had long since rebelled against the revolution.

But what Comrade Serov did not expect was that his letter of repentance seemed to have fallen into disgrace, and Beria and the leaders of the Georgian Internal Affairs Department seemed to have forgotten that such a bad guy existed. Until the purge was basically over, no one came to arrest him.

Although no one came to arrest him, Serov suffered from restlessness and frequent nightmares. He would often hear someone knocking on the door hard in his dream.

Dong dong dong, dong dong dong...

Lying on the bed, Serov heard a familiar knock on the door again. This must be a dream again, Serov thought as he lay in bed.

Suddenly he felt his wife Yelena pushing him again and shouting: "Efimov, Yefimov! Someone is knocking on the door..."

Serov opened his eyes suddenly, and he really heard the sound of the door being banged hard - not the door of his bedroom, but the door on the first floor (he was the First Secretary of the Autonomous Republic, and of course he lived in a small building in Perak) . I could still vaguely hear the rough voice of Martinov, the head of the Adjara regional bureau of the NKVD.

"Comrade Serov, Comrade Serov, open the door quickly, something big has happened!"

It's over, arrested... Serov's heart suddenly sank, then he sighed and said to his wife beside him: "Yelena, bring me that bag..."

"That bag", many cadres of the Soviet Bolshevik Party during this period had such preparations. This is a red heart, two preparations! Yelena was also a woman who had seen the world, and she did not burst into tears at the moment. She just helped her husband put on his clothes with tears in her eyes, then handed a large suitcase to her husband Serov and kissed him goodbye - even though they were an old couple and a young wife, Moreover, the appearance of the two of them is not a good match, but their relationship is very good.

Serov, carrying a large suitcase, went downstairs alone, but the door downstairs was already open. It was the staff (servant) of Serov's family who was awakened (it was less than 6 o'clock in the morning) and opened the door.

"Comrade Secretary... what are you doing with a suitcase? Do you want to go out?" Martynov, who is 10 years younger than Serov and graduated from Dzerzhinsky Vocational School, is a tall man. At this time, he is already in full military uniform, with his head Wearing a blue hat, an armed belt around his waist, and a holster on the armed belt!

It seemed that he was here to arrest himself, a counter-revolutionary and corrupt person.

Serov smiled bitterly: "Comrade Martinov, are you here to arrest me?"

"Arrest?" Martinov was stunned for a moment, then stamped his foot, "Comrade Serov, are you kidding? How could I come to arrest you?"

Not an arrest? Serov was still in a daze, but Martynov had already jumped up and pulled Serov out.

"Something big has happened! Comrade Secretary, imperialism is coming!"

"What? What? Who called?" Serov became even more confused after hearing Martynov's words.

"Turkey!" Martinov gritted his teeth and said, "Turkish imperialism has launched a surprise attack on the Soviet Union! Just now, comrades from the Border Guards (also under the control of the NKVD) called me and said that a large number of Turkish planes were found crossing the border! I I called you but no one answered, so I came over directly (the two are neighbors).”

Türkiye attacks the Soviet Union? How can this be?

When Serov was really confused, a series of explosions suddenly came over.

"This is..." Serov quickly threw away his suitcase and ran out of his small building as fast as he could. Then he looked around in the yard and saw that the newly bright sky in the west was already reflected by the light of the fire. It was red, and from time to time, huge fireballs would rise, and with the loud rumbling noise, the ground would tremble. Vaguely, in the sky illuminated by fire, you can still see groups of small planes from unknown countries circling high in the sky...

"The oil refinery! The oil refinery was bombed! It was really bombed..." Serov shouted loudly, with an expression of disbelief on his face.

Turkish imperialism was so insane that it dared to bomb the Soviet Union! It seems that Comrade Stalin's judgment is correct. The closer the Soviet Union is to communism, the more intensified the class struggle situation will be, because imperialism is determined to destroy the Soviet Union!

…

"What? Batumi was bombed?" Stalin received a call from Voroshilov during breakfast reporting that Batumi had been bombed. "Is it a British and French plane? Are Baku and Grozny next to each other?" ?”

Stalin was not so confused that he thought it was a Turkish plane that bombed Batum. In fact, as early as last year, he received a report from the Red Army Intelligence Bureau that "British and French may bomb the oil-producing areas of Baku, Grozny and Batumi." Afterwards, he also ordered the Red Air Force to mobilize more than 300 fighter jets (all outdated I-16 and I-153) and 10 anti-aircraft artillery regiments, stationed in Baku, Grozny and Batumi respectively. They also had people deploy the latest radar invention on the border between the Soviet Union and Türkiye. It was originally planned to further increase the defense there, but then Britain, the United States and France began to win over the Soviet Union, and Stalin relaxed his vigilance, so...

Voroshilov's voice on the phone was urgent and fast, "Comrade General Secretary, currently only Batumi has reported being bombed, while Baku and Grozny have not been bombed."

"Oh," Stalin nodded, "How is the situation in Batumi?"

"Batum was suddenly attacked by about 100 enemy planes at 6 o'clock this morning. Our border guard's radar station detected the invading enemy in time, but the I-16s and I-153s stationed in Batum had no time to take off. (At this time, the detection range of the RUS-1 radar used by the Soviet Union was insufficient, only more than 30 kilometers), so... the Batumi Refinery suffered relatively serious losses! "

"Serious losses?" Stalin's face suddenly darkened, "How could this be? Don't you have anti-aircraft guns? Have you shot down any enemy planes?"

"One was shot down, and the mark on the wreckage is that it's a French aircraft..."

"Only one?" Stalin was a little annoyed. "An entire anti-aircraft artillery regiment shot down one enemy plane?"

"Only one," said Voroshilov.

Stalin frowned, "What about the fighter jets? Have they taken off?"

"27 I-16s and 19 I-153s took off, but..."

"But what?" Stalin asked calmly.

"These enemy planes quickly increased their altitude, making it difficult for our I-16s and I-153s to reach them."

At this time, the Soviet Union's Yak-1 and MiG-1 had not yet been put into production. Only a small amount of Lago-3 was delivered to the Red Air Force, but they were all used against the Finnish Air Force. Therefore, the only ones placed in the Caucasus Mountains are the old-fashioned I-16 and I-153. The performance of these two aircraft is too backward, and neither of them has a closed cabin, so the practical ceiling is not high enough, and the speed is slow. After dropping the bomb, the LeO-451 The bomber raised its altitude and swaggered away.

"Can't reach it?" Stalin's face turned pale. "Doesn't that mean they can come and leave whenever they want?"

"This..." Voroshilov didn't know what to say.

Because the Soviet-German aviation industry cooperation was interrupted a few years ago, the Soviet Union's research and development of new fighter jets was affected. Therefore, it went from being in the lead a few years ago to falling behind now...

"How is the situation at the Batumi Refinery?" Stalin suddenly remembered that the Batumi Petrochemical City was the most important oil processing center in the Soviet Union. "How much is the loss? Will production be affected?"