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Little Chicago was laid out in a section of the Ukraine so thoroughly and often devastated by drought, famine, and war that it was necessary to evacuate only a few kulaks to clear an area of a hundred square miles. This reservation was barricaded by mine fields, electrically charged wire, and watchtowers. In its center was erected a town in microcosm. Except that it nested in no suburbs and farmland and all its buildings were new, externally it could have been Glebe City, Iowa.

The concept behind the training of Stanley Smith and his companions was as old, in warfare, as the Trojan Horse. Something of the kind had been tried, spectacularly but without success, by the Germans in the Battle of the Bulge. A battalion of English-speaking soldiers had been dressed in American uniforms and infiltrated through the lines to spread confusion and seize bridges in Bradley's rear. The Germans, usually so methodical, had not had time for adequate preparation and training. The Red Army did not intend to make the same mistake.