The German attack on 22 June 1941 came as a total surprise to the Soviet Union, although war had been expected already since the mid-1930s. The ‘new imperialist war’ had become a ‘fact’ as Stalin told his audience at the 18th Party Congress in March 1939, pointing to the conflicts in Africa and East Asia. At this time ‘war’ had already penetrated the daily language as had the theme of ‘capitalist encirclement’ and the metaphor of the Soviet Union as a ‘besieged fortress’. Psychologically, though not only psychologically, the Soviet people already lived in a state of war. Militarily they actually were being prepared for war. It is striking to see that Soviet military expenditure in the 1930s was high as Germany's. The workforce was being transformed, step by step, into a mobilised working army. Freedom of movement and free choice of workplace, already restricted by ‘work-books’ and internal passports, were formally abolished on 26 June 1940, when a law was passed that turned the relationship at the place of work into a military one. On 19 October of the same year workers were finally mobilised. Not only could they no longer freely leave their place of work, but they could be transferred without their consent to different ones. Additionally, at the request of the trade unions, as was made public, and without wage compensation, the working day was extended from seven to eight hours and the working week from five to six days, with Sunday again as the common day of rest.