[PEN-L:319] Churchill "Planned Third World War

["Frank Durgin" <fdurgin1@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

 This is a repeat of a message I sent some 20
minutes ago which for some reason came out
jagged and difficult to read.

Soory
Frank



Russia Today
       Thu., Oct. 01, 1998 at: NY 7:14 a.m.
 Lon 12:14 p.m.
 Pra 1:14 p.m. Mos
                                                      3:14 p.m.

Churchill "Planned Third World War
against Stalin"

LONDON -- (Agence France Presse) Winston
Churchill, the British wartime leader, ordered
his War Cabinet within days of the defeat of
Germany in 1945 to draw up contingency
plans for an invasion of the Soviet Union, it
was reported Thursday.

The battle plan, said to be contained in Top
Secret documents obtained by the Daily
Telegraph, recommended re-arming up to
100,000 German troops to help half a million
British and U.S. soldiers fight their erstwhile

The 29-page report, codenamed Operation
Unthinkable, was presented to Churchill on
May 22, 1945, 14 days after the end of the
World War II in Europe, according to the
London newspaper.

It assumed that the Third World War would
start on July 1, 1945, probably with a
surprise attack by 47 British and American
divisions between Dresden and the Baltic, the
daily said.

Stalin in retaliation was expected to invade
Turkey, Greece, Norway and the oil fields of
Iran and Iraq, as well as launch extensive
sabotage operations in France and the
Netherlands.

But the War Cabinet plan ruled out "total
war" against the Red Army, which
one, adding that there was no reason why an
Anglo-American invasion of Russia would
fare any better than Hitler's Operation
Barbarossa.

The documents, discovered in Britain's
Public Records Office, showed that planning
was carried out at the very highest level of the
British government and military, said the
Daily Telegraph.

Churchill described the plan as "a purely
hypothetical contingency" but nonetheless set
his planning staff to work on it amid the
euphoria of victory.

He eventually rejected the plan on the advice
of the Chiefs of Staff and replaced it with a
defensive scheme to guard against invasion
by the Red Army, the newspaper said.
 ( (c) 1998 Agence France Presse)