Stalin's Order to Evacuate
Iosif Stalin, On Evacuating Foreign Missions and the Soviet Government from Moscow. October 15, 1941
Translated by Kristen Edwards
State Defense Committee Resolution about evacuating foreign diplomatic missions, the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR, the Council of People's Commissariats, and the People's Commissariats of Defense and of the Navy.
Original Source: Izvestiia TsK KPSS, No 12 (1990), p. 217.
In view of the unsuccessful line of defense in the Mozhaisk Raion, the State Defense Committee resolves to:
Have Comrade Molotov announce to foreign missions that they should evacuate to the city of Kuibyshev today (Comrade Kaganovich of the People's Commissariat of Transportation should provide trains for the missions in a timely manner, and Comrade Beria of the People's Commissar of Interior Affairs [NKVD] should organize their security).
Evacuate the Presidium of the Supreme Council along with the government and Vice-Chairman Comrade Molotov (Comrade Stalin is evacuating tomorrow or after, depending on the situation).
Immediately evacuate the organs of the People's Commissariat of Defense and the People's Commissariat of the Navy to Kuibyshev, and the main group of the General Staff to Arzamas.
In the event that enemy forces appear at the gates of Moscow, entrust Comrade Beria and Comrade Shcherbakov of the NKVD to carry out the demolition of enterprises, warehouses and institutions that are impossible to evacuate, and also the demolition of the electrical equipment of the metro (excluding the water supply system and the sewage system).
Chairman of the State Defense Committee I. Stalin
Source: M. M. Gorinov, V. N. Parkhachev, and A. N. Ponomarev, eds. Moskva prifrontovaia, 1941 1942: Arkhivnye dokumenty i materialy. (Moscow: Izdatel stvo ob edineniia Mosgorarkhiv, 2001), p. 261.