In the silent Kremlin, Stalin was holding a pipe and listening to Beria's recent special investigation without any expression.

Belia's calm voice was invisible panic, because he couldn't help but start to be afraid in the face of the truth, and he knew that these truths could not represent all, and the reported data should have been reduced layer by layer. For example, when the data on the lost land in the Battle of the Castle will no longer be counted. But no matter how shrinking, it cannot withstand the terrible numbers.

"Grassroots party organizations in various places show that since May, more than 10,000 people have died abnormally due to hunger, malnutrition or non-food consumption, mainly the elderly, infants, and weak. The current grassroots grain inventory is about 7-10 days, and the military grain inventory is about 25-days. There are currently about 3 months left before the harvest season. Maybe, maybe, about..." He said tremblingly, "The abnormal death is nearly 80,000 to 10,000."

"Have the food obtained from the Far East, China and India included? Have the food obtained from the US aid been included?"

"The U.S. aid food has been counted, and the rest are the core combat preparation materials personally controlled by Comrade Voroshilov. It was not counted, but the total amount was not large, with a total of less than 80,000 tons." Beria wiped his cold sweat, "This is all the emergency combat preparation food for the army. Without your instructions, we dare not touch these foods."

"Release half out." Stalin said expressionlessly, "I will talk to Comrade Voroshilov, and let Comrade Budoni go to Mongolia. He braged to me last time, but failed to complete all the tasks."

Belia knew what it meant to go to Mongolia to get another robbery on the Mongolian grassland that had been looted once. As for whether Mongolia could survive or not, Stalin was no longer considered. He nodded subconsciously.

"The Ministry of Internal Affairs also conducted an investigation into social and political atmosphere. Since May, more people have treasoned and surrendered to the enemy. Although grassroots organizations have carried out strict control and ideological education, many wavering elements are still emerging..."

"It's not that beliefs have been shaken, but that their stomachs have been shaken..." Stalin stopped Belia's explanation and notes, "Just tell me the numbers directly."

In fact, it is also difficult for the Ministry of Internal Affairs to obtain these numbers. The grassroots are not fools. The number of people who suddenly come to investigate the treason and surrender to the enemy is obviously badly motivated. Maybe they should also take the grassroots leaders who are ineffective in control as typical examples. This is a big matter that will cause the head to lose their minds, so they tend to conceal or not report as much as possible. But Beria is not a good person. He quickly came up with a response method to let the various organizational systems change the grassroots party organization secretaries and let new officials be responsible for supervising statistics. He also clearly told them that if he does not tell the truth and does not find any problems, then in the future, if there is an existing problem, the original person in charge will not be responsible, and the person in charge will be fully responsible; on the contrary, if there is a problem, the person in charge will not be responsible.

Theoretically, the Ministry of Internal Affairs has no right to interfere with the personnel transfer and organizational operation of grassroots party organizations, but the Ministry of Internal Affairs is too famous and the power of the great purge is still there. Besides, it is not really involved in the appointment and removal matters, but the temporary exchange is carried out, and localities can only accept it with their noses. Once this method comes out, no one is willing to take the blame for others. Besides, there are still problems in their own jurisdiction.

The numbers reported further are relatively reliable. Of course, collective fraud may be inevitable, but this is a minority after all, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs has not yet found it. It is not that it cannot be found, but that Belia did not let the people do whatever they want. He vaguely felt that Comrade Stalin's thoughts and practices were changing. Now it is better to be stable and not to cause trouble.

"Since May, the total population of the fugitive enemy-occupied areas has exceeded 40,000, and another 20,000-0,000 people have been intercepted by grassroots organizations..." Beria secretly glanced at Stalin, "Most of the fugitives' compositions are not good, and they have always performed very ordinary in the local area. Middle-aged women fled the most with infants and young children, followed by men over 60, and there are not many people who fled directly from the army."

Stalin nodded, intuition telling him that the number is more credible, the army's food supply is much better than that of the people, and the control is much stronger. Once deserters appear, they will be shot.

"What if I give them another 2oo?"

"This..." Belia was stunned. He didn't understand what Stalin was thinking.

"There are many people in the rear who have lost their labor force, and we do not have enough food to support them. From humanitarianism and to reduce our burden, they are pushed to the side of the enemy. What do you think Vlasov would think?" Without waiting for Belia to answer, Stalin said to himself, "Didn't he profess to rescue the Russian people from dire straits? Let him raise the 20,000 people for us first."

As he spoke, his tone became stern: "If the enemy refuses to support them, their rumors will be self-defeated, and the people will recognize his true face; if the enemy really accepts the 20,000 people, it will inevitably greatly increase their economic, financial and food burdens, and can also restrain the necessary time for military and social settlement. I don't believe that Vlasov can take out things to control these people, and he doesn't care. Will Hitler take care? It would be even better if the SS sent them into the concentration camp. This will only inspire the people to fight the fascists to the end."

Beria lowered her head very low and whispered: "Will this damage the image of the Party? And it will cause an impact on the people's thoughts?"

"The impact is inevitable, just controllable. Can it affect the image more than starving people to death?" Stalin made up his mind. "The Ministry of Internal Affairs and grassroots party organizations make arrangements based on the population they have, and the proportion is temporarily controlled at 5%. It is necessary to ensure that the population is completely incapable of working or suffering from various injuries."

Beria quickly agreed.

The final report was a secret investigation on the peace talks, mainly targeting senior generals and important officials, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs investigated them entirely by itself. Before the report, Belia was not sure about Stalin's intentions and wrote three reports in one breath: the first one was agreed by most people; the second one was opposed by most people; and the third one was the conclusion and analysis he found. He originally wanted to find out Stalin's tone from the previous two investigation reports in order to submit the corresponding report in a targeted manner, so that the leader's words seemed convincing, but at present, he still couldn't figure out Stalin's trump card.

After hesitating for a long time, he finally took out the third report from the document bag with cruelty.

"Among the members of the Political Bureau, more than 75% of the people agree with the decision you proposed, thinking that you might as well contact the enemy and talk about conditions, even if it can actually delay time and survive this winter. The rest of the comrades believe that they can follow Comrade Lenin's original actions, make peace with the Germans, and even temporarily cede the enemy-occupied areas to the Germans. As for whether they occupy themselves or support the puppet regime, we will not interfere, but we must not actively recognize the puppet regime; among the non-Political Bureau members, most of them believe that the sacrifice is too great at present, but they can still grit their teeth and persevere."

Stalin nodded. This situation was in line with his perception. The news of the two peace talks between Bulgaria and Germany was passed at the political bureau meeting, but the level of the Central Committee was unknown, so they felt confused and at a loss.

"It is worth noting that we have heard more than once Comrade Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev's discussion on peace talks. He advocated that the party, the state and the army be completely relocated to the east of the Ural Mountains, and to conclude a truce agreement with the enemy without war, and..." Belia paused, "and heard that he sold the statement to several other political-bureau members and front commanders... for the moment..."

Beria suddenly stopped.

"Speak, why not?"

"The following situations are the result of speculation by comrades from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and there is no direct evidence." Beria whispered, without authorization to directly monitor a political-bureau member, he had to be careful.

"It's okay, keep talking."

"There seems that there are not many comrades in other political and bureaus who agree with this view. The commanders of several fronts in the direction of Stalingrad are disgusted with this... It seems that Comrade Zhukov, Comrade Vasilevsky and Comrade Kuznetsov once discussed the situation."

"What do they say?" Stalin felt his breathing become a little rapid: the highlight is coming.

"Comrade Zhukov believes that in this war, we can only use the method of luring the enemy into the deep. In the Napoleon era, luring the enemy to the front line of Moscow was enough. However, due to the advancement of the times and technological power, the army's mobility has increased, and now there is a greater space for luring the enemy. Retreating to the Ural Mountain is a good strategy.

At the same time, from China's war practice, we can also see that since the Japanese invasion of Manchuria, China's political center gradually shifted inward, retreating from Nanjing to Chongqing 15oo kilometers away in one breath. Finally, under a long period of resistance, the enemy forced to extend the front line, so that they could not maintain it and were forced to shrink. If you cannot reach a more decent truce situation according to your vision, you might as well retreat to the east of the Ural Mountains.

If the German army was going to move forward and approach the Ural Mountains, it would mean that their supply line would reach Yar in the west, South Africa in the south, Norway in the north, and Ural Mountains in the east, and would be nearly 5 ooo kilometers in either direction (10,000 kilometers south). With Germany's territory, population and industrial capacity, it would not be able to maintain it anyway, and it would eventually collapse in a centripetal manner.
Chapter completed!