The Pripet Marshes, also known as the Pinsk Marshes, cover more than 100,000 square miles straddling Belarus and Ukraine.
I became aware of them in November last year when I was in Minsk. Valeryia Sashko takes ornithologists to the marshes to see many endangered species in the largest wetlands in Europe. Hitler and the German High Command were not aware of the marshes and this contributed to the failure of the German invasion in the summer of 1941 – a campaign supposed to be wrapped up in five months before the onset of winter. Only 20% of German forces were issued with winter clothing – the troops that would stay to garrison a conquered Russia. German Intelligence under-estimated the scale of Russian forces. They were unaware that Stalin had moved a large part of his armament factories east, out of reach of the Luftwaffe. To their surprise Russian materiel was better than they thought. Unlike German jackboots, Russian soldiers had waterproof boots. More importantly Russian KV 1 tanks were superior to German Panzer IVs. Critically, Stalin wasn’t a quitter although his political and military centralisation of command led to much needless loss of life.
It’s worth considering how the Allies and the Axis were led. Roosevelt is the gold standard. He didn’t interfere but he did try to be a good broker between his Chiefs of Staff and those in the UK using Churchill as a conduit. Hitler micro-managed his campaigns and did not brook criticism; Churchill tried to do the same. Fortunately Churchill had military commanders who could stand up to him and who had strategic vision. Dowding and Portal commanded RAF Fighter Command and Brooke, home forces; they were realists, able to rein in Churchill’s vivid imagination. I’m not sure Dudley Pound was such a pillar of strength as First Sea Lord. Churchill’s strength was to communicate with the British people, the Commonwealth, Dominions and Roosevelt and Stalin. He was an inspirational leader but not a military strategist, although without him Britain might have weakened and surrendered in 1940. The democratic deficit in Germany sealed its fate.
Now I need to move on to lighter fare, although there is a lot to be learnt from history and plenty of time to read it these days. A retired British soldier has told me – of course he knew jackboots leaked and Russian boots were watertight. You learn a lot at Sandhurst.