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Gumbinnen Operation
The Gumbinnen Operation,Glantz, ''Failures of Historiography'' also known as the Goldap Operation (or Goldap-Gumbinnen Operation, russian: Гумбиннен-Гольдапская наступательная операция), was a Soviet offensive on the Eastern Front late in 1944, in which forces of the 3rd Belorussian Front attempted to penetrate the borders of East Prussia. Planning The operation was planned as a result of the success of the Memel Offensive Operation to the north. The troops of the 1st Baltic and 3rd Belorussian Fronts had succeeded in pushing the Third Panzer Army back to the East Prussian border, surrounding the city of Memel and reaching the shore of the Curonian Lagoon. '' Stavka'' permitted Chernyakhovsky to further exploit this success by attacking along the Gumbinnen – Insterburg – Königsberg (now Kaliningrad) axis deep into East Prussia. Chernyakhovsky's plan involved using the 11th Guards and 5th Armies to break open the German defen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Panther Tank
The Panther tank, officially ''Panzerkampfwagen V Panther'' (abbreviated PzKpfw V) with ordnance inventory designation: ''Sd.Kfz.'' 171, is a German medium tank of World War II. It was used on the Eastern and Western Fronts from mid-1943 to the end of the war in May 1945. On 27 February 1944 it was redesignated to just ''PzKpfw Panther'', as Hitler ordered that the Roman numeral "V" be deleted. In contemporary English-language reports it is sometimes referred to as the "Mark V". The Panther was intended to counter the Soviet T-34 medium tank and to replace the Panzer III and Panzer IV. Nevertheless, it served alongside the Panzer IV and the heavier Tiger I until the end of the war. It had excellent firepower, protection and mobility, although its reliability was less impressive. The Panther was a compromise. While having essentially the same Maybach V12 petrol (690 hp) engine as the Tiger I, it had better gun penetration, was lighter and faster, and could traverse roug ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
3rd Belorussian Front
The 3rd Belorussian Front () was a Front of the Red Army during the Second World War. The 3rd Belorussian Front was created on 24 April 1944 from forces previously assigned to the Western Front. Over 381 days in combat, the 3rd Belorussian Front suffered 166,838 killed, 9,292 missing, and 667,297 wounded, sick, and frostbitten personnel while advancing from the region some 50 kilometers southeast of Vitebsk in Russia to Königsberg in East Prussia. Operations the 3rd Belorussian Front took part in include the Belorussian Offensive Operation, the Baltic Offensive Operation, and the East Prussian Offensive Operation. Although costly, the advance of the 3rd Belorussian Front was in great part victorious, with one of the few defeats occurring during the Gumbinnen Operation in October 1944. 3rd Belorussian Front was formally disbanded on 15 August 1945.David Glantz, ''Companion to Colossus Reborn'', p. 36, Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2005 Commanders * Colonel Gene ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gusev, Kaliningrad Oblast
Gusev (russian: Гу́сев; german: Gumbinnen; lt, Gumbinė; pl, Gąbin) is a town and the administrative center of Gusevsky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located at the confluence of the Pissa and Krasnaya Rivers, near the border with Poland and Lithuania, east of Chernyakhovsk. Population: History The settlement of Gumbinnen (from lt, Gumbinė: pumpkin) in the Duchy of Prussia, a vassal duchy of the Kingdom of Poland, was first mentioned in a 1580 deed. A Protestant parish was established in Gumbinnen at the behest of the Hohenzollern thanks to Duke Albert of Prussia about 1545 and the first church was erected in 1582. It became part of Brandenburg-Prussia in 1618, remaining a fief of Poland. From the 18th century, it was part of the Kingdom of Prussia. Between 1709 and 1711 the area was devastated by the Great Northern War plague outbreak and had to be redeveloped under the rule of the "Soldier King" Frederick William I of Prussia, who granted Gumbinnen town ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stavka
The ''Stavka'' (Russian and Ukrainian: Ставка) is a name of the high command of the armed forces formerly in the Russian Empire, Soviet Union and currently in Ukraine. In Imperial Russia ''Stavka'' referred to the administrative staff, and to the General Headquarters in the late 19th-century Imperial Russian armed forces and subsequently in the Soviet Union. In Western literature it is sometimes written in uppercase (''STAVKA''), although whether it is an acronym is a subject of debate. ''Stavka'' may refer to its members, as well as to the headquarters location (its original meaning from the old Russian word ''ставка'', 'tent'). Stavka of the Supreme Commander during World War I The commander-in-chief of the Russian army at the beginning of World War I was Grand Duke Nicholas Nicholaievitch, a grandson of Tsar Nicholas I. Appointed at the last minute in August 1914, he played no part in formulating the military plans in use at the beginning of the war. Nik ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curonian Lagoon
The Curonian Lagoon (or Bay, Gulf; russian: Куршский залив, lt, Kuršių marios, pl, Zalew Kuroński, german: Kurisches Haff, lv, Kuršu joma) is a freshwater lagoon separated from the Baltic Sea by the Curonian Spit. Its surface area is . The Neman River ( lt, Nemunas) supplies about 90% of its inflows; its watershed consists of about 100,450 square kilometres in Lithuania and Russia's Kaliningrad Oblast. Human history In the 13th century, the area around the lagoon was part of the ancestral lands of the Curonians and Old Prussians. Later it bordered the historical region of Lithuania Minor. At the northern end of the Spit, the Klaipėda Strait connects the lagoon to the Baltic Sea, and the place was chosen by the Teutonic Knights in 1252 to found ''Memelburg'' castle and the city of Memel — officially called Klaipėda in 1923–39, when the Memel Territory was separated from Germany, and again after 1945, when it became part of the Lithuanian SSR. As the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Klaipėda
Klaipėda (; ; german: Memel; pl, Kłajpeda; russian: Клайпеда; sgs, Klaipieda) is a city in Lithuania on the Baltic Sea coast. The capital of the eponymous county, it is the third largest city and the only major seaport in Lithuania. The city has a complex recorded history, partially due to the combined regional importance of the usually ice-free Port of Klaipėda at the mouth of the river . Located in the region of Lithuania Minor, at various times, it was a part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Prussia and Germany until the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. As a result of the 1923 Klaipėda Revolt it was annexed by Lithuania and has remained with Lithuania to this day, except between 1939 and 1945 when it was occupied by Germany following the 1939 German ultimatum to Lithuania. The population has migrated from the city to its suburbs and hinterland. The number of inhabitants of Klaipėda city shrank from 202,929 in 1989 to 162,360 in 2011, but the urban zone ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Memel
The Battle of Memel or the siege of Memel (german: Erste Kurlandschlacht) was a battle which took place on the Eastern Front during World War II. The battle began when the Red Army launched its ''Memel offensive operation'' (russian: Мемельская наступательная операция) in late 1944. The offensive drove remaining German forces in the area that is now Lithuania and Latvia into a small bridgehead in Klaipėda (Memel) and its port, leading to a three-month siege of that position. The bridgehead was finally crushed as part of a subsequent Soviet offensive, the East Prussian offensive, in early 1945. Prelude The Soviet Belorussian offensive of June–August 1944 (commonly known as Operation Bagration) had seen the German Army Group Centre nearly destroyed and driven from what is now Belarus, most of what is now Lithuania and much of Poland. During August and September of that year, a series of German counter-offensives – Operations Doppelkopf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eastern Front (World War II)
The Eastern Front of World War II was a Theater (warfare), theatre of conflict between the European Axis powers against the Soviet Union (USSR), Polish Armed Forces in the East, Poland and other Allies of World War II, Allies, which encompassed Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Northern Europe, Northeast Europe (Baltic states, Baltics), and Southeast Europe (Balkans) from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945. It was known as the Great Patriotic War (term), Great Patriotic War in the Soviet Union – and still is in some of its successor states, while almost everywhere else it has been called the ''Eastern Front''. In present-day German and Ukrainian historiography the name German-Soviet War is typically used. The battles on the Eastern Front of the Second World War constituted the largest military confrontation in history. They were characterised by unprecedented ferocity and brutality, wholesale destruction, mass deportations, and immense loss of life due to combat, starvation, expos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national republics; in practice, both its government and its economy were highly centralized until its final years. It was a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with the city of Moscow serving as its capital as well as that of its largest and most populous republic: the Russian SFSR. Other major cities included Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk ( Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR), and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over and spanning eleven time zones. The country's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917, when the Bolsheviks, under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Russian Provisional Government ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1st Air Army
__NOTOC__ The 1st Air Army (russian: 1-я воздушная армия) was an Air Army in the Soviet Air Force which served during World War II. It was formed on May 10, 1942, within the Soviet Western Front, and renamed the 26th Air Army on January 10, 1949, in the Belorussian Military District. After the war, it was reformed on July 1, 1957, and was active until 1998. Second World War When it was formed, the 1st Air Army was made up of two fighter aviation divisions (with four fighter aviation regiments each), two mixed aviation divisions (with two fighter aviation regiments, two assault aviation regiments and one bombing regiment each) a training aviation regiment, a long-range reconnaissance aviation regiment, a communications squadron, and a night close-range bombing aviation regiment. Structure 1942 May 10, 1942: *201st Fighter Aviation Division *202nd Fighter Aviation Division *203rd Fighter Aviation Division *214th Assault Aviation Division *215th Mixed Aviation Div ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
31st Army (Soviet Union)
The 31st Army was a field army of the Red Army during the Second World War. Formation The army was formed on July 15, 1941 in the Moscow Military District. It was ordered to create a defensive line along Ostashkov - Selizharovo - Rzhev. The army was stationed between the 27th Army to the north and the 49th Army to the south. 31st Army was formed with the following units: : 244th Rifle Division : 246th Rifle Division : 247th Rifle Division : 249th Rifle Division and on August 1, it was assigned to the Reserve Front, and added the following units: : 119th Rifle Division : 110th Tank Division :43rd Corps Artillery Regiment :766th Antitank Artillery Regiment :537th Miner-Sapper Battalion The army was assigned to the Reserve Front on July 30, 1941, and it moved to the defensive line along Ostashkov - Yeltsy - Tishina River. It entered combat on October 2, 1941. At that time, the army was composed of: : 5th Rifle Division :110th Rifle Division : 119th Rifle Division : 247th Rifl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
39th Army (Soviet Union)
The 39th Army was a Field Army of the Soviet Union's Red Army during World War II and of the Soviet Army during the Cold War. Formation and Kalinin Offensive It was first formed on 15 November 1941 in the Arkhangelsk Military District, in accordance with a directive issued by the Stavka (command headquarters) on 2 November 1941. The army was directly subordinate to the Stavka. On 1 December 1941 the army was listed by the Soviet General Staff's official order of battle listings as including seven rifle divisions and two cavalry divisions ( 355th, 357th, 361st, 369th, 373rd, 377th, and 381st Rifle Divisions, plus 76th and 94th Cavalry Divisions. On 1 December 1941 the army was tasked to build defense lines along the eastern bank of the river Sheksna. After regrouping in the area of Torzhok it was sent to the Kalinin Front on 22 December, where the 39th Army took part in the Kalinin Offensive Operation. The Kalinin Offensive Operation had begun on 5 December 1941 and was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
