VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften Das Kaukasusprojekt der Alliierten vom Jahre 1940 (Rheinisch-Westfälische Akademie der Wissenschaften)

From October 1939 on, the British and French general staff discussed possibilities for joint military action agairrst the Soviet Union as a potential ally of the German Reich. Apart from weakening the USSR such action was to reinforce the economic blockade agairrst Germany. An allied expedition- ary corpswas to be organized under the socalled "Northplan"; the engage- ment of this corps in Scandinavia was to lead to an easing of the military pressure on the Finns in the winter campaign of 1939/40 and also to a command of the North Swedish ore deposits. In January, 1940, the Allied Chiefs of Staff began to consider a parallel "Southplan", and serious pre- parations for its execution were begun in March. lts aim was to launch a joint English-French attack, if possible with Turkish support, on the Soviet oil centres in the Caucasus Mountains. Such an attack by the French General Headquarters - set for the end of June or beginning of July, 194- became pointless after the German offensive agairrst France in May, 1940. The English took up the "Southplan" again after the French surrender, and discussions of its possibilities can be traced up to a few days before the German attack on the Soviet Union in June, 1941. Resurne Depuis octobre 1939, les etats-majors generaux britannique et fran ais ont discute a maintes reprises de mesures militaires contre l'Union Sovieti- que en tant qu'allie potentiel du Reich allemand.