The Great Patriotic War

The just war in which the Soviet people fought against German Fascism and its accomplices in order to defend their motherland.

On the morning of June 22, 1941, German fascists tore up the non-aggression treaty signed by the Soviet Union and Germany, deployed 190 superior forces including 153 German divisions, and launched an attack on the Soviet Union in the form of “blitzkrieg” war. Under the leadership of the Party and government headed by Stalin, the Soviet people launched a four-year Great Patriotic War. Thus, World War II also entered a new historical stage.

At the beginning of the war, Germany rapidly occupied various regions of Lithuania, most of Latvia, Belarus and Ukraine. In the critical moment of life and death, the Council of People’s Commissariat of the Soviet Union and the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (Bolshevik) issued an emergency decree on June 29, 1941, calling on all the people to fully understand the seriousness of the war situation and shift the focus all work according to the wartime conditions. On June 30, 1941, the Soviet Union set up a National Defense Commission to concentrate all the power and resources of the state and carry out the Great Patriotic War. On July 3, Stalin, as chairman of the National Defense Commission of the Soviet Union, made a radio speech, calling on the Soviet people to “do everything for the front line and victory in the war!” On September 17, the National Defense Commission ordered a general compulsory military service throughout the country. At the end of 1941, 100,000 Communist Party members and 2 million Communist Youth League members had joined the army. At the same time, the Soviet Union established the headquarters of the Supreme Command, and Stalin was appointed the Supreme Commander of the Red Army of the USS.R..

Between September 30 to October 2, 1941, the German army invaded Moscow. The Soviet army launched active defense and a counteroffensive on December 6, and by January 1942, it won a major victory in the Moscow defense war and declared the bankruptcy of Hitler’s “blitzkrieg attack” plan. In the summer of 1942, the German army launched another attack on the southwest front and concentrated its main military forces on Stalingrad. On November 9, the Soviet army launched a counter-offensive in Stalingrad. On February 2, 1943, the Soviet Army completely annihilated the main military forces of Germany, eliminated and captured more than 300,000 German troops, won the great victory in the battle of Stalingrad, and fundamentally reversed the destiny of the Patriotic War and the World War II.

Next, the Soviet army won the battle of Kursk, eliminated 120,000 enemies and recovered a large part of the lost territory. In 1944, the Soviet army launched a general counterattack by carrying out ten major attacks on the German fascist army, and recovered all the occupied lands, and from then on, the Soviet Army turned its attention to enemy territories to fight, forcing Finland, Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary to withdraw from the war and turn against the Nazi Germany. Since the beginning of 1945, the Soviet army launched a strong offensive, successively conquered Poland and Czechoslovakia. On May 2, 1945, the Soviet Union entered Berlin with the cooperation of the Anti-fascist Allies, on May 8, and Germany declared its unconditional surrender.

The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union was one of the main battlefields in the World Anti-fascist War. In the Great Patriotic War, the Soviet people and the Red Army sacrificed more than 30 million people. The victory of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union not only safeguarded the great achievements of the socialist revolution of the Soviet Union, but also made great contributions to the victory of the global Anti-fascist War carried out by the people all over the world.