What Stalin Knew

Article — Read at NYTimes.com

I hope the K.G.B. documents that archivists from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum received from Moscow (news article, Oct. 29) throw light on three secrets.

First, who ordered NKVD, Stalin's secret police, in June 1941 to close Polish, Lithuanian and Latvian frontiers, cutting off escape from the Nazis for thousands of Jews?

Second, when did Stalin learn that the murder of Jews began with the first hours of the war? According to available evidence, the information about the killing of the Jews did not reach Western countries until the middle of 1942, a year after the killings had begun. It is unbelievable that the Russians did not know about the atrocities much before that.

Third, why did Stalin in his July 3 radio address not warn the Jews about the Nazi onslaught? In his speech he mentioned all other Soviet peoples that he deemed endangered by the Nazis; only Jews were conspicuous by their absence. Although Stalin helped many Jews to evade the Nazis, the K.G.B. archives may show that he condemned thousands of others.

ANDREW EZERGAILIS
Ithaca, N.Y., Oct. 29, 1996
Professor of History, Ithaca College
PUBLISHED NOVEMBER 1, 1996