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124-690: The command traces its lineage to the 65th Army of the Red Army , a field army of the Soviet Union during World War II . It was formed in October 1942 from rebuilding elements of the first formation of the 4th Tank Army on the Don Front . The army was commanded by Pavel Batov until after the fall of Berlin, and served in various Fronts commanded by Konstantin Rokossovsky for the duration of

248-607: A Viking voyage to eastern Europe. The River Dnieper has been a subject for artists, great and minor, over the centuries. Major artists with works based on the Dnieper are Arkhip Kuindzhi and Ivan Aivazovsky . The River Dnieper makes an appearance in the 1964 Hungarian drama film The Sons of the Stone-Hearted Man (based on the novel of the same name by Mór Jókai ), where it appears when two characters are leaving Saint Petersburg but get attacked by wolves. In 1983,

372-607: A body "formed from the class-conscious and best elements of the working classes." All citizens of the Russian republic aged 18 or older were eligible. Its role being the defense "of the Soviet authority, the creation of a basis for the transformation of the standing army into a force deriving its strength from a nation in arms, and, furthermore, the creation of a basis for the support of the coming Socialist Revolution in Europe." Enlistment

496-498: A collective committee of Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko , Pavel Dybenko , and Nikolai Krylenko . At the same time, Nikolay Dukhonin was acting as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief after Alexander Kerensky fled from Russia. On 12 November 1917 the Soviet government appointed Krylenko as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, and because of an "accident" during the forceful displacement of the commander-in-chief, Dukhonin

620-718: A combined-arms army, the 65th Army, as part of Rokossovsky's new Don Front. This was accomplished by mid-November, and at this time the army consisted of: 65th Army played a leading role in Operation Uranus , the encirclement of the German forces at Stalingrad. Attacking out of the Kremenskaya bridgehead on the south bank of the Don . Rokossovsky later wrote in reference to Batov and his army: "[He] displayed fine initiative with an improvised mobile task force... By striking at

744-565: A common border between Japanese controlled areas and the Soviet Far East and Mongolia . The Soviets and Japanese, including their respective client states of the Mongolian People's Republic and Manchukuo , disputed the boundaries and accused the other side of border violations. This resulted in a series of escalating border skirmishes and punitive expeditions , including the 1938 Battle of Lake Khasan , and culminated in

868-664: A few days the German Ninth Army was encircled and mostly destroyed. For his performance, Batov was promoted to Colonel General. 65th Army crossed the Bug River on July 22, and pushed on to cross the Narev River , north of Warsaw, by Sept. 4. Operation Bagration had run out of steam, but Batov's army held off strong German counterattacks against the Narev bridgehead for more than two months. Following this, Rokossovski

992-418: A further 1,836,000 returned from German captivity. Thus the grand total of losses amounted to 8,668,400. This is the official total dead , but other estimates give the number of total dead up to almost 11 million men, including 7.7 million killed or missing in action and 2.6 million prisoners of war (POW) dead (out of 5.2 million total POWs), plus 400,000 paramilitary and Soviet partisan losses. Officials at

1116-503: A hundred times as many tanks . The Red Army, however, had been hindered by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin 's Great Purge of 1937, reducing the army's morale and efficiency shortly before the outbreak of the fighting. With over 30,000 of its army officers executed or imprisoned, most of whom were from the highest ranks, the Red Army in 1939 had many inexperienced senior officers. Because of these factors, and high commitment and morale in

1240-454: A major reshuffling took place in the Soviet military administration. On 13 March 1918, the Soviet government accepted the official resignation of Krylenko and the post of Supreme Commander-in-Chief was liquidated. On 14 March 1918, Leon Trotsky replaced Podvoisky as the Narkom of War Affairs. On 16 March 1918, Pavel Dybenko was relieved from the office of Narkom of Marine Affairs. On 8 May 1918,

1364-545: A stable nucleus. By 1925, this system provided 46 of the 77 infantry divisions and one of the eleven cavalry divisions. The remainder consisted of regular officers and enlisted personnel serving two-year terms. The territorial system was finally abolished, with all remaining formations converted to the other cadre divisions, in 1937–1938. The Soviet military received ample funding and was innovative in its technology. An American journalist wrote in 1941: Even in American terms

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1488-521: A surrender the following day although some Japanese units continued to fight for several more days. A proposed Soviet invasion of Hokkaido , the second largest Japanese island, was originally planned to be part of the territory to be taken but it was cancelled. Military administration after the October Revolution was taken over by the People's Commissariat of War and Marine affairs headed by

1612-801: Is Özü or Özi . The total length of the river is variously given as 2,145 kilometres (1,333 mi) or 2,201 km (1,368 mi), of which 485 km (301 mi) are within Russia, 700 km (430 mi) are within Belarus , and 1,095 km (680 mi) are within Ukraine . Its basin covers 504,000 square kilometres (195,000 sq mi), of which 289,000 km (112,000 sq mi) are within Ukraine, 118,360 km (45,700 sq mi) are within Belarus. The source of

1736-505: Is / d ə ˈ n iː p r oʊ / . The Ukrainian name has a rare form Дніпр , Dnipr and rare dialectal Дніпер , Dniper . The Middle Ukrainian form attested in the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries was Днѣпръ , Dnǐpr . The city of Dnipro is named for the river. The name varies slightly in the local Slavic languages of the three countries through which it flows: These names are all cognate, deriving from Old East Slavic Дънѣпръ ( Dŭněprŭ ). The origin of this name

1860-593: Is also close to the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station ( Chernobyl Exclusion Zone ) which is located next to the mouth of the Pripyat River . Almost 2,000 km (1,200 mi) of the river is navigable (to the city of Dorogobuzh ). The Dnieper is important for transportation in the economy of Ukraine . Its reservoirs have large ship locks, allowing vessels of up to 270 by 18 metres (886 ft × 59 ft) access as far as

1984-622: Is disputed but generally derived from either Sarmatian * Dānu Apara ("Farther River") in parallel with the Dniester ("Nearer River") or from Scythian * Dānu Apr ("Deep River") in reference to its lack of fords , from which was also derived the Late Antique name of the river, Δάναπρις Danapris , as found in the Ravenna Cosmography . The earlier Graeco-Roman name of the river, as attested by Herodotus ,

2108-639: Is due to the influence of the Old East Slavic epic The Tale of Igor's Campaign and its modern adaptations on Ukrainian literature. This usage also lent its name to the city of Slavutych , founded in the wake of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 to house displaced workers, and to the Slavutych station of the Kyiv Metro . In Crimean Tatar , the river is known as Özü . In Turkish it

2232-520: Is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe , rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk , Russia , before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea . Approximately 2,200 km (1,400 mi) long, with a drainage basin of 504,000 square kilometres (195,000 sq mi), it is the longest river of Ukraine and Belarus and the fourth- longest river in Europe , after

2356-516: The 65th Army was reorganised as the 7th Mechanised Army at Łódź . On 20 December, it became the 7th Tank Division (Mobilization), with its divisions becoming regiments. It was headquartered in Borisov from May 1948. On 21 March 1950, it was increased in strength to an army with its old designation. In 1955 the 7th Mechanized Army was equipped with the IS-3 , T-54 , T-34 and PT-76 tanks, as well as

2480-552: The Great Meadow . The first constructed was the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station (or DniproHES) near Zaporizhzhia , built between 1927 and 1932 with an output of 558 MW. It was destroyed during World War II , but was rebuilt in 1948 with an output of 750 MW. Major cities, over 100,000 in population, are in bold script. Cities and towns located on the Dnieper are listed in order from

2604-543: The Gulag . During the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army conscripted 29,574,900 men in addition to the 4,826,907 in service at the beginning of the war. Of this total of 34,401,807 it lost 6,329,600 killed in action (KIA), 555,400 deaths by disease and 4,559,000 missing in action (MIA) (most captured). Of the 4.5 million missing, 939,700 rejoined the ranks in the subsequently liberated Soviet territory, and

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2728-576: The ISU-122 self-propelled gun. In 1957, the 7th Mechanized Army was transformed into 7th Tank Army. In 1960, the 47th Guards Tank Division was renamed the 45th Guards Tank Division. In 1965, the 45th Guards Rivne Tank Division became a training tank formation subordinated to the Belorussian Military District , and the 39th Guards Tank Division was reorganized into the 37th Guards Rechitsa Tank Division . From 1960 to 1980,

2852-958: The Imperial Japanese Army ), the doctrine was not used. Only in the Second World War did deep operations come into play. The Red Army was involved in armed conflicts in the Republic of China during the Sino-Soviet conflict (1929) , the Soviet invasion of Xinjiang (1934), when it was assisted by White Russian forces, and the Islamic rebellion in Xinjiang (1937) in Northwestern China . The Red Army achieved its objectives; it maintained effective control over

2976-627: The Oder River , near Stettin-an-Oder , where it once again forced a difficult river crossing in April 1945. Officials of the city surrendered to Colonel A. G. Frolenkov's 193rd Rifle Division on April 26. In Demmin on and around May 1, 1945, members of the 65th Army of the 2nd Belorussian Front first broke into a distillery and then rampaged through the town, committing mass rapes, arbitrarily executing civilians, and setting fire to buildings. Many Demmin civilians committed suicide . In April 1946,

3100-619: The Pripyat River to the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station , there are six sets of dams and hydroelectric stations , which produce 10% of Ukraine's electricity. The Kakhovka dam was destroyed on 6 June 2023 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine , with the subsequent drying up of the Kakhovka Reservoir revealing the original course of the river in the area and disconnecting four canal networks known as

3224-458: The Pripyat River , a tributary of the Dnieper, just upstream from its confluence with the Dnieper. The Dnieper is an important navigable waterway for the economy of Ukraine and is connected by the Dnieper–Bug Canal to other waterways in Europe. During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine , certain segments of the river were made part of the defensive lines between territory controlled by

3348-732: The Russian Constituent Assembly (5–6 January 1918) and the Soviet government signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918), removing Russia from the First World War. Freed from international obligations, the Red Army confronted an internecine war against a variety of opposing anti-Bolshevik forces, including the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine led by Nestor Makhno , the anti-White and anti-Red Green armies , efforts to restore

3472-797: The Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union . The army was established in January 1918 by Leon Trotsky to oppose the military forces of the new nation's adversaries during the Russian Civil War , especially the various groups collectively known as the White Army . In February 1946, the Red Army (which embodied the main component of the Soviet Armed Forces alongside the Soviet Navy )

3596-629: The Scud -equipped 76th Rocket Brigade . After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus were created on the basis of the Belorussian Military District , including the 7th Tank Army. In 1993, the 7th Tank Army was renamed the 7th Army Corps, and in 1994 the 65th Army Corps. In December 2001, as a result of the reform of the Armed Forces of Belarus, the corps

3720-610: The Soviet invasion of Manchuria on 9 August 1945 (three days after the first atomic bombing of Hiroshima and the same day the second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki , while also being exact three months after the surrender of Germany). It was the largest campaign of the Soviet–Japanese War , which resumed hostilities between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the Empire of Japan after almost six years of peace following

3844-964: The United States . In total, the U.S. deliveries to the USSR through Lend-Lease amounted to $ 11 billion in materials ($ 180 billion in the 2020 money value): over 400,000 jeeps and trucks; 12,000 armored vehicles (including 7,000 tanks, about 1,386 of which were M3 Lees and 4,102 M4 Shermans ); 14,015 aircraft (of which 4,719 were Bell P-39 Airacobras , 2,908 were Douglas A-20 Havocs and 2,400 were Bell P-63 Kingcobras ) and 1.75 million tons of food. Soviet soldiers committed mass rapes in occupied territories, especially in Germany . The wartime rapes were followed by decades of silence. According to historian Antony Beevor , whose books were banned in 2015 from some Russian schools and colleges, NKVD (Soviet secret police) files have revealed that

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3968-703: The Volga , Danube , and Ural rivers. In antiquity, the river was part of the Amber Road trade routes. During the Ruin in the later 17th century, the area was contested between the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia , dividing what is now Ukraine into areas described by its right and left banks. During the Soviet period , the river became noted for its major hydroelectric dams and large reservoirs. The 1986 Chernobyl disaster occurred on

4092-627: The Wehrmacht in combat. The Axis's numeric superiority rendered the combatants' divisional strength approximately equal. A generation of Soviet commanders (notably Georgy Zhukov ) learned from the defeats, and Soviet victories in the Battle of Moscow , at Stalingrad , Kursk and later in Operation Bagration proved decisive. In 1941, the Soviet government raised the bloodied Red Army's esprit de corps with propaganda stressing

4216-502: The Wehrmacht was especially harsh. Per a 1941 Stalin directive , Red Army officers and soldiers were to "fight to the last" rather than surrender; Stalin stated: "There are no Soviet prisoners of war, only traitors". During and after World War II freed POWs went to special " filtration camps ". Of these, by 1944, more than 90% were cleared, and about 8% were arrested or condemned to serve in penal battalions . In 1944, they were sent directly to reserve military formations to be cleared by

4340-587: The brigade and regimental levels. The commissars also had the task of spying on commanders for political incorrectness . In August 1918, Trotsky authorized General Mikhail Tukhachevsky to place blocking units behind politically unreliable Red Army units, to shoot anyone who retreated without permission. In 1942, during the Great Patriotic War (1941–1945) Joseph Stalin reintroduced the blocking policy and penal battalions with Order 227 . The Soviet westward offensive of 1918–1919 occurred at

4464-532: The death penalty . Simultaneously, Trotsky carried out a mass recruitment of officers from the old Imperial Russian Army , who were employed as military advisors ( voenspetsy ). The Bolsheviks occasionally enforced the loyalty of such recruits by holding their families as hostages. As a result of this initiative, in 1918 75% of the officers were former tsarists . By mid-August 1920 the Red Army's former tsarist personnel included 48,000 officers, 10,300 administrators, and 214,000 non-commissioned officers . When

4588-407: The triumphantly advancing enemy. The Red Guard units are brushed aside like flies. We have no power to stay the enemy; only an immediate signing of the peace treaty will save us from destruction." The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) can be divided into three periods: At the start of the civil war, the Red Army consisted of 299 infantry regiments . The civil war intensified after Lenin dissolved

4712-683: The "Second Soviet-Finnish War") which was a conflict fought by Finland and Germany against the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1944. In accordance with the Soviet-Nazi Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 23 August 1939, the Red Army invaded Poland on 17 September 1939, after the Nazi invasion on 1 September 1939. On 30 November, the Red Army also attacked Finland, in the Winter War of 1939–1940. By autumn 1940, after conquering its portion of Poland, Nazi Germany shared an extensive border with

4836-466: The 1929 Field Regulations and became codified in the 1936 Provisional Field Regulations (PU-36). The Great Purge of 1937–1939 and the 1941 Red Army Purge removed many leading officers from the Red Army, including Tukhachevsky himself and many of his followers, and the doctrine was abandoned. Thus, at the Battle of Lake Khasan in 1938 and in the Battle of Khalkhin Gol in 1939 ( major border conflicts with

4960-542: The 1932–1939 Soviet–Japanese border conflicts . The Red Army, with support from Mongolian forces, overwhelmed the Japanese Kwantung Army and local Chinese forces supporting them. The Soviets advanced on the continent into the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo , Mengjiang (the northeast section of present-day Inner Mongolia which was part of another puppet state) and via an amphibious operation

5084-768: The 7th Tank Army was awarded the Order of the Red Banner . A USSR Ministry of Defense directive dated 25 January 1989 ordered the disbandment of the 3rd Guards Tank Division , effective from 1 June 1989. Instead, the 19th Guards Nikolaevsk-Budapest Tank Division was moved from the Southern Group of Forces in Hungary to Zaslonovo. On 7 November 1990 Tank Army had 764 T-62 and T-72 tanks, 208 infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers, as well as 212 guns, mortars and multiple rocket launchers. It also included

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5208-408: The All-Russian Chief Headquarters was created, headed by Nikolai Stogov and later Alexander Svechin . On 2 September 1918, the Revolutionary Military Council (RMC) was established as the main military administration under Leon Trotsky, the Narkom of War Affairs. On 6 September 1918 alongside the chief headquarters, the Field Headquarters of RMC was created, initially headed by Nikolai Rattel . On

5332-430: The Army. The Council of People's Commissars appointed itself the supreme head of the Red Army, delegating command and administration of the army to the Commissariat for Military Affairs and the Special All-Russian College within this commissariat. Nikolai Krylenko was the supreme commander-in-chief, with Aleksandr Myasnikyan as deputy. Nikolai Podvoisky became the commissar for war, Pavel Dybenko , commissar for

5456-455: The Bolshevik Revolution took place there were few machines in Russia. Marx said Communism must come in a highly industrialized society. The Bolsheviks identified their dreams of socialist happiness with machines which would multiply production and reduce hours of labour until everyone would have everything he needed and would work only as much as he wished. Somehow this has not come about, but the Russians still worship machines, and this helped make

5580-651: The Dnieper is the sedge bogs (Akseninsky Mokh) of the Valdai Hills in central Russia, at an elevation of 220 m (720 ft). For 115 km (71 mi) of its length, it serves as the border between Belarus and Ukraine. Its estuary, or liman , used to be defended by the strong fortress of Ochakiv . The southernmost point in Belarus is on the Dnieper to the south of Kamaryn in Brahin Raion . The Dnieper has many tributaries (up to 32,000) with 89 being rivers of 100+ km. The main ones are, from its source to its mouth , with left (L) or right (R) bank indicated: Many small direct tributaries also exist, such as, in

5704-543: The Dungan Cavalry Regiment commanded by the Dungan Magaza Masanchi . It also co-operated with armed Bolshevik Party-oriented volunteer units, the Forces of Special Purpose from 1919 to 1925. The slogan "exhortation, organization, and reprisals" expressed the discipline and motivation which helped ensure the Red Army's tactical and strategic success. On campaign, the attached Cheka special punitive brigades conducted summary field court-martial and executions of deserters and slackers. Under Commissar Yan Karlovich Berzin ,

5828-451: The Eastern Front consisted of an estimated 3,604,800 KIA/MIA within the 1937 borders plus 900,000 ethnic Germans and Austrians outside the 1937 border (included in these numbers are men listed as missing in action or unaccounted for after the war) and 3,576,300 men reported captured (total 8,081,100); the losses of the German satellites on the Eastern Front approximated 668,163 KIA/MIA and 799,982 captured (total 1,468,145). Of these 9,549,245,

5952-408: The Finnish forces, Finland was able to resist the Soviet invasion for much longer than the Soviets expected. Finnish forces inflicted stunning losses on the Red Army for the first three months of the war while suffering very few losses themselves. Hostilities ceased in March 1940 with the signing of the Moscow Peace Treaty . Finland ceded 9% of its pre-war territory and 30% of its economic assets to

6076-423: The German corridor to Stalingrad from August to October, 1942, until it was severely depleted in strength. (It was derisively known for a time as the "four-tank army" due to the few vehicles still operational.) Pavel Batov , who had previously commanded the 51st Army and the 3rd Army , assumed command on October 22, 1942, a command he would hold until the end of the War. He had orders to rebuild these forces as

6200-401: The German surrender at Stalingrad, Rokossovsky's forces were redeployed northwest to become the new Central Front in the region around Kursk . 65th Army exploited a gap between the weak Second German Army and the Second Panzer Army , but was brought to a halt by the spring rasputitsa , German reserves released by their evacuation of the Rzhev Salient , and the German counter-offensive to

6324-421: The Kyiv area, the Syrets (right bank) in the north of the city, the historically significant Lybid (right bank) passing west of the centre, and the Borshahivka (right bank) to the south. The water resources of the Dnieper basin compose around 80% of the total for all Ukraine. The Dnieper Rapids were part of the trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks , first mentioned in the Kyiv Chronicle. The route

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6448-399: The Manchurian Chinese Eastern Railway , and successfully installed a pro-Soviet regime in Xinjiang . The Soviet–Japanese border conflicts , also known as the "Soviet–Japanese Border War" or the first "Soviet–Japanese War", was a series of minor and major conflicts fought between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan from 1932 to 1939. Japan's expansion into Northeast China created

6572-474: The Military Band of the Headquarters of the Kiev Military District led by A. Kuzmenko, singers Anatoliy Mokrenko , Lyudmila Zykina , Anatoliy Solovianenko , Dmytro Hnatyuk , Mykola Hnatyuk . Filming on the battlefield, streets and squares of Kiev. Scriptwriter – Victor Meerovsky. Directed by Victor Cherkasov. Operator – Alexander Platonov. The 2018 film Volcano was filmed at the river in Beryslav , Kherson Oblast . In 1941, Mark Fradkin wrote "Song of

6696-418: The NKVD. Further, in 1945, about 100 filtration camps were set for repatriated POWs, and other displaced persons , which processed more than 4,000,000 people. By 1946, 80% civilians and 20% of POWs were freed, 5% of civilians, and 43% of POWs were re-drafted, 10% of civilians and 22% of POWs were sent to labor battalions, and 2% of civilians and 15% of the POWs (226,127 out of 1,539,475 total) were transferred to

6820-460: The Red Army finally achieving a Soviet-Mongolian victory over Japan and Manchukuo at the Battles of Khalkhin Gol in September 1939. The Soviet Union and Japan agreed to a ceasefire. Later the two sides signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact on 13 April 1941, which resolved the dispute and returned the borders to status quo ante bellum . The Winter War ( Finnish : talvisota , Swedish : finska vinterkriget , Russian: Зи́мняя война́ )

6944-481: The Red Army numbered some 6.5 million men, many of whom the Army had difficulty supporting, around 581,000 in the two operational fronts, western and southwestern. Around 2.5 million men and women were mobilized in the interior as part of reserve armies. The XI Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) (RCP (b)) adopted a resolution on the strengthening of the Red Army. It decided to establish strictly organized military, educational and economic conditions in

7068-517: The Red Army the most highly mechanized in the world, except perhaps the German Army now. Like Americans, the Russians admire size, bigness, large numbers. They took pride in building a vast army of tanks, some of them the largest in the world, armored cars, airplanes, motorized guns, and every variety of mechanical weapons. Dnepr River The Dnieper ( /( d ə ) ˈ n iː p ər / (də)- NEE -pər ), also called Dnepr or Dnipro ( / d ə ˈ n iː p r oʊ / də- NEE -proh ),

7192-404: The Red Army was composed mainly of peasants, the families of those who served were guaranteed rations and assistance with farm work. Some peasants who remained at home yearned to join the Army; men, along with some women, flooded the recruitment centres. If they were turned away, they would collect scrap metal and prepare care-packages. In some cases, the money they earned would go towards tanks for

7316-474: The Red Army with an initial Red Guard organization and a core soldiery of Red Guard militiamen and the Cheka secret police. Conscription began in June 1918, and opposition to it was violently suppressed. To control the multi-ethnic and multi-cultural Red Army soldiery, the Cheka operated special punitive brigades which suppressed anti-communists , deserters , and " enemies of the state ". The Red Army used special regiments for ethnic minorities, such as

7440-483: The Red Army's defeat of Pyotr Wrangel in the south in 1920 allowed the foundation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in December 1922. Historian John Erickson sees 1 February 1924, when Mikhail Frunze became head of the Red Army staff, as marking the ascent of the general staff , which came to dominate Soviet military planning and operations. By 1 October 1924 the Red Army's strength had diminished to 530,000. The list of Soviet divisions 1917–1945 details

7564-411: The Red Army's strength was 401 divisions. The Soviet forces were apparently unprepared despite numerous warnings from a variety of sources. They suffered much damage in the field because of mediocre officers, partial mobilization, and an incomplete reorganization. The hasty pre-war forces expansion and the over-promotion of inexperienced officers (owing to the purging of experienced officers) favored

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7688-473: The Russian Central Defense Ministry Archive (CDMA) maintain that their database lists the names of roughly 14 million dead and missing service personnel. The majority of the losses, excluding POWs, were ethnic Russians (5,756,000), followed by ethnic Ukrainians (1,377,400). As many as 8 million of the 34 million mobilized were non-Slavic minority soldiers, and around 45 divisions formed from national minorities served from 1941 to 1943. The German losses on

7812-418: The Russian Central Defense Ministry Archive (CDMA) maintain that their database lists the names of roughly 14 million dead and missing service personnel. In September 1917, Vladimir Lenin wrote: "There is only one way to prevent the restoration of the police, and that is to create a people's militia and to fuse it with the army (the standing army to be replaced by the arming of the entire people)." At

7936-499: The Russians and the Ukrainians. The river is also sometimes called by the Russian name Dnepr . The initial D in Dnieper is generally silent when pronounced in English, although it may be sounded: / ˈ n iː p ər / or / d ə ˈ n iː p ər / . It derives from Russian : Днепр , romanized :  Dnepr , pre-revolutionary spelling Днѣпръ , Dněpr . Dnipro derives from Ukrainian : Дніпро , romanized :  Dnipro . The English pronunciation

8060-518: The Soviet Union made Red Army logistical support difficult because many depots (and most of the USSR's industrial manufacturing base) lay in the country's invaded western areas, obliging their re-establishment east of the Ural Mountains. Lend-Lease trucks and jeeps from the United States began appearing in large numbers in 1942. Until then, the Red Army was often required to improvise or go without weapons, vehicles, and other equipment. The 1941 decision to physically move their manufacturing capacity east of

8184-415: The Soviet Union. Soviet losses on the front were heavy, and the country's international reputation suffered. The Soviet forces did not accomplish their objective of the total conquest of Finland but did receive territory in Karelia , Petsamo , and Salla . The Finns retained their sovereignty and improved their international reputation, which bolstered their morale in the Continuation War (also known as

8308-436: The Soviet defence budget was large. In 1940 it was the equivalent of $ 11,000,000,000, and represented one-third of the national expenditure. Measure this against the fact that the infinitely richer United States will approximate the expenditure of that much yearly only in 1942 after two years of its greatest defence effort. Most of the money spent on the Red Army and Air Force went for machines of war. Twenty-three years ago when

8432-439: The Soviets released 3,572,600 from captivity after the war, thus the grand total of the Axis losses came to an estimated 5,976,645. Regarding POWs, both sides captured large numbers and had many die in captivity – one recent British figure says 3.6 of 6 million Soviet POWs died in German camps, while 300,000 of 3 million German POWs died in Soviet hands. In 1941, the rapid progress of the initial German air and land attacks into

8556-431: The USSR, with whom it remained neutrally bound by their non-aggression pact and trade agreements . Another consequence of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina , carried out by the Southern Front in June–July 1940 and Soviet occupation of the Baltic states . These conquests also added to the border the Soviet Union shared with Nazi-controlled areas. For Adolf Hitler ,

8680-422: The Ural Mountains kept the main Soviet support system out of German reach. In the later stages of the war, the Red Army fielded some excellent weaponry, especially artillery and tanks. The Red Army's heavy KV-1 and medium T-34 tanks outclassed most Wehrmacht armor, but in 1941 most Soviet tank units used older and inferior models. The Red Army was financially and materially assisted in its wartime effort by

8804-399: The Western European waterways was possible, but a weir without any ship lock near the town of Brest, Belarus , has interrupted this international waterway. Poor political relations between Western Europe and Belarus mean there is little likelihood of reopening this waterway in the near future. River navigation is interrupted each year by freezing and severe winter storms. From the mouth of

8928-636: The army. However, it was recognized that an army of 1,600,000 would be burdensome. By the end of 1922, after the Congress, the Party Central Committee decided to reduce the Red Army to 800,000. This reduction necessitated the reorganization of the Red Army's structure. The supreme military unit became corps of two or three divisions. Divisions consisted of three regiments. Brigades as independent units were abolished. The formation of departments' rifle corps began. After four years of warfare,

9052-522: The basis of the 7th Tank Army was formed by the 3rd Guards Kotelnikovo , the 34th Dnieper, and the 37th Guards Rechitsa Tank Divisions. The formation actively participated in well-known large-scale exercises and maneuvers such as "Dnepr", "Neman", "Dvina", Exercise Zapad-81 and "Fall 88". By a Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet on 15 January 1974, for good results in combat training,

9176-576: The beginning of its existence, the Red Army functioned as a voluntary formation, without ranks or insignia. Democratic elections selected the officers. However, a decree on 29 May 1918 imposed obligatory military service for men of ages 18 to 40. To service the massive draft, the Bolsheviks formed regional military commissariats ( voyennyy komissariat , abbr. voyenkomat ), which as of 2023 still exist in Russia in this function and under this name. Military commissariats, however, should not be confused with

9300-480: The brigades took hostages from the villages of deserters to compel their surrender; one in ten of those returning was executed. The same tactic also suppressed peasant rebellions in areas controlled by the Red Army, the biggest of these being the Tambov Rebellion . The Soviets enforced the loyalty of the various political, ethnic, and national groups in the Red Army through political commissars attached at

9424-532: The casualties that the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS suffered during the war, and ultimately captured the German capital, Berlin . Up to 34 million soldiers served in the Red Army during World War II, 8 million of which were non-Slavic minorities. Officially, the Red Army lost 6,329,600 killed in action (KIA), 555,400 deaths by disease and 4,559,000 missing in action (MIA) ( mostly captured ). The majority of

9548-733: The circumstance was no dilemma, because the Drang nach Osten ("Drive towards the East") policy secretly remained in force, culminating on 18 December 1940 with Directive No. 21, Operation Barbarossa , approved on 3 February 1941, and scheduled for mid-May 1941. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, in Operation Barbarossa, the Red Army's ground forces had 303 divisions and 22 separate brigades (5.5 million soldiers) including 166 divisions and brigades (2.6 million) garrisoned in

9672-420: The civil war ended in 1922, ex-tsarists constituted 83% of the Red Army's divisional and corps commanders. In 1919, 612 "hardcore" deserters of the total 837,000 draft dodgers and deserters were executed following Trotsky's draconian measures. According to Figes, "a majority of deserters (most registered as "weak-willed") were handed back to the military authorities, and formed into units for transfer to one of

9796-576: The concert program "Song of the Dnieper" from the "Victory Salute" series was released, dedicated to the 40th anniversary of the liberation of the city of Kiev from the German fascist invaders. The program includes songs by Soviet composers, Ukrainian folk songs , and dances performed by the Song and Dance Ensemble of the Kiev Military District led by A. Pustovalov, P. Virsky Ukrainian National Folk Dance Ensemble , Kyiv Bandurist Capella ,

9920-750: The defeated Provisional Government, monarchists, but mainly the White Movement of several different anti-socialist military confederations. "Red Army Day", 23 February 1918, has a two-fold historical significance: it was the first day of conscription (in Petrograd and Moscow), and the first day of combat against the occupying Imperial German Army . The Red Army controlled by the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic also against independence movements, invading and annexing newly independent states of

10044-549: The defense of Motherland and nation, employing historic exemplars of Russian courage and bravery against foreign aggressors. The anti-Nazi Great Patriotic War was conflated with the Patriotic War of 1812 against Napoleon , and historical Russian military heroes, such as Alexander Nevsky and Mikhail Kutuzov , appeared. Repression of the Russian Orthodox Church temporarily ceased, and priests revived

10168-499: The depth of the enemy's ground forces, inducing catastrophic defensive failure. The deep-battle doctrine relies upon aviation and armor advances with the expectation that maneuver warfare offers quick, efficient, and decisive victory. Marshal Tukhachevsky said that aerial warfare must be "employed against targets beyond the range of infantry , artillery , and other arms. For maximum tactical effect aircraft should be employed en masse , concentrated in time and space, against targets of

10292-419: The enemy's flank and rear, the task force ensured the swift advance of the other units." In the lead up to Operation Ring the 65th mounted an attack by two rifle divisions against the positions of the German 44th Infantry Division on January 7, 1943. This attack penetrated the German defensive line and inflicted severe casualties. A counterattack by German armor contained the Soviet advance, but did not regain

10416-516: The fleet. Proshyan, Samoisky, Steinberg were also specified as people's commissars as well as Vladimir Bonch-Bruyevich from the Bureau of Commissars. At a joint meeting of Bolsheviks and Left Socialist-Revolutionaries , held on 22 February 1918, Krylenko remarked: "We have no army. The demoralized soldiers are fleeing, panic-stricken, as soon as they see a German helmet appear on the horizon, abandoning their artillery, convoys and all war material to

10540-569: The formations of the Red Army in that time. In the late 1920s and throughout the 1930s, Soviet military theoreticians – led by Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky – developed the deep operation doctrine, a direct consequence of their experiences in the Polish–Soviet War and in the Russian Civil War. To achieve victory, deep operations envisage simultaneous corps - and army-size unit maneuvers of simultaneous parallel attacks throughout

10664-574: The former Russian Empire. This included three military campaigns against the army of the Ukrainian People's Republic , in January–February 1918, January–February 1919, and May–October 1920. Conquered nations were subsequently incorporated into the Soviet Union. In June 1918, Leon Trotsky abolished workers' control over the Red Army, replacing the election of officers with traditional army hierarchies and criminalizing dissent with

10788-456: The highest tactical importance." "To the Red army, Stalin has dealt a fearful blow. As a result of the latest judicial frameup, it has fallen several cubits in stature. The interests of the Soviet defense have been sacrificed in the interests of the self-preservation of the ruling clique." Trotsky on the Red Army purges of 1937. Red Army deep operations found their first formal expression in

10912-667: The hundreds of thousands, and possibly as many as two million. While the Soviets considered the surrender of Germany to be the end of the "Great Patriotic War", at the earlier Yalta Conference the Soviet Union agreed to enter the Pacific Theater portion of World War II within three months of the end of the war in Europe . This promise was reaffirmed at the Potsdam Conference held in July 1945. The Red Army began

11036-426: The institution of military political commissars . In the mid-1920s, the territorial principle of manning the Red Army was introduced. In each region, able-bodied men were called up for a limited period of active duty in territorial units, which constituted about half the army's strength, each year, for five years. The first call-up period was for three months, with one month a year thereafter. A regular cadre provided

11160-417: The leadership knew what was happening, but did little to stop it. It was often rear echelon units who committed the rapes. According to professor Oleg Rzheshevsky, "4,148 Red Army officers and many privates were punished for committing atrocities". The exact number of German women and girls raped by Soviet troops during the war and occupation is uncertain, but historians estimate their numbers are likely in

11284-423: The life of any soldier and (almost any) officer of the unit to which he was attached. In 1942, Stalin established the penal battalions composed of gulag inmates, Soviet PoWs, disgraced soldiers, and deserters, for hazardous front-line duty as tramplers clearing Nazi minefields, et cetera. Given the dangers, the maximum sentence was three months. Likewise, the Soviet treatment of Red Army personnel captured by

11408-440: The losses, excluding POWs, were ethnic Russians (5,756,000), followed by ethnic Ukrainians (1,377,400). Of the 4.5 million missing, 939,700 rejoined the ranks in liberated Soviet territory, and a further 1,836,000 returned from German captivity. The official grand total of losses amounted to 8,668,400. This is the official total dead , but other estimates give the number of total dead up to almost 11 million. Officials at

11532-576: The nature in Russian literature. The river was also described in the works of Taras Shevchenko . In the adventure novel The Long Ships (also translated Red Orm ), set during the Viking Age , a Scanian chieftain travels to the Dnieper Rapids to retrieve a treasure hidden there by his brother, encountering many difficulties. The novel was very popular in Sweden and is one of few to depict

11656-654: The northern portion of Korea . Other Red Army operations included the Soviet invasion of South Sakhalin , which was the Japanese portion of Sakhalin Island (and Russia had lost to Japan in 1905 in the aftermath of the Russo-Japanese War ), and the invasion of the Kuril Islands . Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender of Japan on 15 August. The commanding general of the Kwantung Army ordered

11780-411: The original line, consumed scarce fuel and ammunition, and exposed the vehicles to concentrated artillery fire, leading to losses. When Ring kicked off at 0805 hours on January 10, 65th Army was backed by a 55-minute artillery barrage from over 500 guns and howitzers and 450 rocket launchers on an attack front of 12 km, the highest density of Soviet artillery achieved to that point of the war. This

11904-472: The port of Kyiv , and thus are an important transportation corridor. The river is used by passenger vessels as well. Inland cruises on the rivers Danube and Dnieper have had a growing market in recent decades. Upstream from Kyiv, the Dnieper receives the water of the Pripyat River . This navigable river connects to the Dnieper-Bug canal , the link with the Bug River . Historically, a connection with

12028-482: The rear armies or directly to the front". Even those registered as "malicious" deserters were returned to the ranks when the demand for reinforcements became desperate". Forges also noted that the Red Army instituted amnesty weeks to prohibit punitive measures against desertion which encouraged the voluntary return of 98,000–132,000 deserters to the army. In September 1918, the Bolshevik militias consolidated under

12152-572: The remaining troops as numbering 10 million. While the Imperial Russian Army was being taken apart, "it became apparent that the rag-tag Red Guard units and elements of the imperial army who had gone over the side of the Bolsheviks were quite inadequate to the task of defending the new government against external foes." Therefore, the Council of People's Commissars decided to form the Red Army on 28 January 1918. They envisioned

12276-712: The river's source (in Russia) to its mouth (in Ukraine): Arheimar , a capital of the Goths , was located on the Dnieper, according to the Hervarar saga . The River Dnieper has been a subject of chapter X of a story by Nikolai Gogol A Terrible Vengeance (1831, published in 1832 as a part of the Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka short stories collection). It is considered as a classical example of description of

12400-557: The river, Var , was derived from Scythian *Varu , meaning "Broad." This name was connected to the Graeco-Roman name of the Volga river, Oarus ( Ancient Greek : Οαρος , romanized :  Oaros ; Latin : Oarus ), which was also derived from Scythian *Varu . In Ukrainian it is also known poetically as Славутич , Slavutych or Славута , Slavuta , from an old name used in Kievan Rus' . This

12524-635: The same day the office of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces was created, and initially assigned to Jukums Vācietis (and from July 1919 to Sergey Kamenev ). The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces existed until April 1924, the end of Russian Civil War . In November 1923, after the establishment of the Soviet Union, the Russian Narkom of War Affairs was transformed into the Soviet Narkom of War and Marine Affairs. At

12648-585: The same time as the general Soviet move into the areas abandoned by the Ober Ost garrisons that were being withdrawn to Germany in the aftermath of World War I . This merged into the 1919–1921 Polish–Soviet War , in which the Red Army invaded Poland, reaching the central part of the country in 1920, but then suffered a resounding defeat in Warsaw , which put an end to the war. During the Polish Campaign

12772-522: The south of Kursk. 65th Army then dug in during the three-month lull in operations, towards the northwestern sector of the Kursk salient. At this time the order of battle of the 65th Army was as follows: Army strength: 100,000, 1,837 guns and mortars, 124 tanks and self-propelled guns. Due to its position in the western sector of the salient, the 65th emerged mostly unscathed from the Battle of Kursk, and

12896-475: The splendid combat qualities of its men, commanders, and, of course, Pavel Batov, a brave and talented soldier." In March, 1945, the order of battle of 65th Army was as follows: For the Danzig operation the army also had the 66th Guards SU Brigade attached, the Red Army's only heavy SU brigade, a potent force of 60 ISU-122 self-propelled guns. The offensive propelled 65th Army into eastern Germany, finally to

13020-714: The supreme command of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic ( Russian : Революционный Военный Совет , romanized :  Revolyutsionny Voyenny Sovyet (Revvoyensoviet) ). The first chairman was Trotsky, and the first commander-in-chief was Jukums Vācietis of the Latvian Riflemen ; in July 1919 he was replaced by Sergey Kamenev . Soon afterwards Trotsky established the GRU (military intelligence) to provide political and military intelligence to Red Army commanders. Trotsky founded

13144-634: The time, the Imperial Russian Army had started to collapse. Approximately 23% (about 19 million) of the male population of the Russian Empire were mobilized; however, most of them were not equipped with any weapons and had support roles such as maintaining the lines of communication and the base areas. The Tsarist general Nikolay Dukhonin estimated that there had been 2 million deserters, 1.8 million dead, 5 million wounded and 2 million prisoners. He estimated

13268-631: The tradition of blessing arms before battle. To encourage the initiative of Red Army commanders, the CPSU temporarily abolished political commissars , reintroduced formal military ranks and decorations, and introduced the Guards unit concept. Exceptionally heroic or high-performing units earned the Guards title (for example 1st Guards Special Rifle Corps , 6th Guards Tank Army ), an elite designation denoting superior training, materiel, and pay. Punishment also

13392-534: The war. Postwar, the 65th Army was moved to the Belorussian Military District , where it became the 7th Mechanized Army. In 1957 it became the 7th Tank Army. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union the army became part of the Belarus Ground Forces and was downsized into the 7th Army Corps in 1993. A year later it was renamed the 65th Army Corps. 4th Tank Army, under command of Maj. Gen. Vasily Kryuchenkin , launched numerous counterattacks against

13516-690: The western military districts. The Axis forces deployed on the Eastern Front consisted of 181 divisions and 18 brigades (3 million soldiers). Three Fronts, the Northwestern , Western , and Southwestern conducted the defense of the western borders of the USSR. In the first weeks of the Great Patriotic War (as it is known in Russia), the Wehrmacht defeated many Red Army units. The Red Army lost millions of men as prisoners and lost much of its pre-war matériel. Stalin increased mobilization, and by 1 August 1941, despite 46 divisions lost in combat,

13640-463: The whole width of the river, about 30 to 40 smaller rapids, obstructing only part of the river, and about 60 islands and islets. After the Dnieper hydroelectric station was built in 1932, they were inundated by Dnieper Reservoir . There are a number of canals connected to the Dnieper: The river is part of the quagga mussel 's native range. The mussel has been accidentally introduced around

13764-751: The world, where it has become an invasive species . The city of Kherson lies on the northern bank, upstream of the Dnieper delta , before the Dnieper meets the Southern Bug river in the Dnieper–Bug estuary . Nowadays the Dnieper River suffers from anthropogenic influence resulting in numerous emissions of pollutants. The Dnieper is close to the Prydniprovsky Chemical Plant radioactive dumps (near Kamianske ) and susceptible to leakage of its radioactive waste. The river

13888-443: Was " Borysthenes " ( Ancient Greek : Βορυσθενης , romanized :  Borusthenēs ; Latin : Borysthenes , Ukrainian : Бористен, Борисфен , romanized :  Borysten, Borysfen ) and later Δάναπρις Danapris . The name Borysthenes was derived from a Scythian name whose form was: Ovid used Borysthenius , an adjective derived from Borysthenes , as the river's poetic Latin name. The Huns ' name for

14012-486: Was a war between the Soviet Union and Finland . It began with a Soviet offensive on 30 November 1939 – three months after the start of World War II and the Soviet invasion of Poland . The League of Nations deemed the attack illegal and expelled the Soviet Union on 14 December 1939. The Soviet forces led by Semyon Timoshenko had three times as many soldiers as the Finns, thirty times as many aircraft, and

14136-473: Was conditional upon "guarantees being given by a military or civil committee functioning within the territory of the Soviet Power, or by party or trade union committees or, in extreme cases, by two persons belonging to one of the above organizations." In the event of an entire unit wanting to join the Red Army, a "collective guarantee and the affirmative vote of all its members would be necessary." Because

14260-460: Was followed by air attacks from the 16th Air Army against positions to the rear of the main German line. About 0900 hours, shock groups of five rifle divisions of the Army, supported by the 91st Tank Brigade and six Guards heavy tank regiments (60-70 KV tanks and 21 Churchill Mark IV tanks ). The front of the 44th Division was smashed quite quickly and four depleted battalions were overrun. Following

14384-677: Was held at the Ashuluk range in Astrakhan Oblast in the Russian Federation. The command participated in exercise "West-2011". The following units are part of the Northwestern Operational Command. Electronic warfare troops: Corps of Engineers: Storage Bases: Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army , often shortened to the Red Army , was the army and air force of

14508-556: Was killed on 20 November 1917. Nikolai Podvoisky was appointed as the Narkom of War Affairs, leaving Dybenko in charge of the Narkom of Marine Affairs and Ovseyenko – the expeditionary forces to the Southern Russia on 28 November 1917. The Bolsheviks also sent out their own representatives to replace front commanders of the Russian Imperial Army . After the signing of Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918,

14632-490: Was probably established in the late eighth and early ninth centuries and gained significant importance from the tenth until the first third of the eleventh century. On the Dnieper the Varangians had to portage their ships round seven rapids, where they had to be on guard for Pecheneg nomads. Along this middle flow of the Dnieper, there were 9 major rapids (although some sources cite a smaller number), obstructing almost

14756-598: Was reassigned to command of 2nd Belorussian Front . A shift in Front boundaries accompanied this, and 65th and 70th Armies became part of his new command. In the following months forces were built up in the Narev bridgehead for an offensive to be launched in January. During the new offensive, 65th Army forced a crossing of the Vistula River in early February. Rokossovski later noted: "I had been with 65th Army since Stalingrad and had had ample opportunity to observe

14880-619: Was renamed 1st Belorussian Front , and in June, 1944, 65th Army took part in major strategic operations in Belorussia . The Army's order of battle at this time was as follows: In a well-known confrontation at the planning stage, Rokossovski convinced Stalin that, given the terrain, it was better to strike two strong blows against the German forces than just one. He was counting on Batov's ability to lead his Army across swampy regions south of Bobruisk , using corduroy roads , swamp shoes, and other means. 65th Army did not disappoint, and within

15004-581: Was renamed the " Soviet Army " – which in turn became the Russian Army on 7 May 1992, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Red Army provided the largest land force in the Allied victory in the European theatre of World War II , and its invasion of Manchuria assisted the unconditional surrender of Imperial Japan . During its operations on the Eastern Front , it accounted for 75–80% of

15128-626: Was transformed into the North-Western Operational Command (NWOC). Since then the troops and staff of the NWOC have participated in the exercises "Neman-2001", "Berezina-2002", "The Shield of the Fatherland – 2004", "Shield of the Union – 2006", "West-2009" and others. A joint operational exercise of the armed forces of the Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation, "Shield of the Union", was held in 2011. The exercise

15252-402: Was used; slackers, malingerers, those avoiding combat with self-inflicted wounds cowards, thieves, and deserters were disciplined with beatings, demotions, undesirable/dangerous duties, and summary execution by NKVD punitive detachments. At the same time, the osobist (NKVD military counter-intelligence officers) became a key Red Army figure with the power to condemn to death and to spare

15376-563: Was well equipped to exploit the German defeat. In late July and August the Army joined in the pursuit of German forces to the Dnepr River . On 15 Oct., with divisional and army artillery firing 1,000 shells per minute in support, the 193rd Rifle Division forced a crossing of the Dnepr. From this point on, the 65th Army began earning a well-deserved reputation for its abilities in river-crossing and bridgehead operations. Rokossovsky's command

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