What I find strange on this map and the earlier quotes on the offensive operations that soviet weaknesses and logistics did not enter the planning. It was only the question of whether Hitler was going to attack that mattered.
Because it wasn't really a
plan yet. It was more of a concept. All of those details you mentioned? They were still being worked through. It's disputed whether Stalin really every actually saw it and there is no evidence that Zhukov actually pressed for it's immediate implementation. Even then it was just one of a number of plans that were being drafted at the time for both offensive and defensive scenario. Some were selected for further development and implementation while others were just filed away.
One thing to note about all of these is their incompleteness. They were more concepts then they were plans. All of the niggling details about precisely which units were to do what and how the logistical arrangements were supposed to work were not fully filled out, assuming the Soviets had gotten that far in the first place. This incompleteness stems from a very basic issue plaguing Soviet war planning in '41: the Soviets did not believe war was coming in 1941 and thus were not preparing for a war in 1941. Had they believed so, they would have grabbed one those plans and modified and truncated it to suit their existing forces rather then continuing to develop at the relatively lax pace.
This become even more peculiar when we consider that we are looking at filtered sources. It was Stalin's main blunder to trust Hitler whereas withholding from the offensive because it was best for the red army would make Stalin perceive wise.
Erm, no... it actually indicates quite the opposite. You clearly need to read
Stumbling Colossus. Glantz pretty well demolishes the idea that the Soviets perceived their army as being ready for an offensive campaign in 1941 is something he thoroughly demolishes and was one of the major reasons for Stalin's denialism over the imminence of the German attack.
I am sure that if this (holding back because it was the best military decision) had ever been the reasoning, it would be highlighted in all the history book as Stalin's moment of wisdom.
Not necessarily. To start with, Stalin didn't just "hold back", he actively refused to shift Soviet armies into defensive postures, distribute supplies, issue clear rules-of-engagement, or even have them man their fighting positions until after the Germans attacked. He took some precautions, but they were largely half-measures which didn't actually improve the combat capabilities of the forces in the field or put them in a more favorable position to actually fulfill their combat missions. Additionally there is the issue of portrayals: A lot of myths or incorrect perceptions manage to continue to exist because of obscuration in the historical record or simple inertia in the filtering process from professional historians to the public at large. World War 2 provides fertile ground for this: during the Cold War, Western Historians largely bought into the sob story perpetrated by German generals that Hitler lost them the war. Because the Soviets were denying access to their archives (as the ones who had captured OKH's headquarters during the Battle of Berlin, they had made off with the overwhelming bulk of the records), there was no real way to contradict them. But when the Berlin Wall fell and OKH's documents were released, analysis of the documentation quickly revealed that the sob stories were just the transparent attempt by the generals to avoid blame. And yet, you still find history books printed as recently as the few years saying something roughly along the lines of "if Hitler had listened to his generals..."
As much as ON likes to lampoon Wehrmacht logistic planning Zhukov went full Rommel with this plan.
No he didn't. Full Rommel would have been if he actually went and tried to have it implemented right then and there, regardless of what STAVKA . He didn't, because the plan was incomplete and he knew it (and also because Stalin would have had him shot for such blatant insubordination).
The May 15th start date would require at least a February authorization
Point of order: May 15th is the date the first draft was submitted by Zhukov to the General Staff for approval, not the date it was supposed to be executed or even implemented. The plan, or at least it's first draft, envisioned a two month preparation period so the earliest it could have been executed would have been mid-July.
