The Far Eastern Front ( Russian: Дальневосточный фронт) was a

front Front may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''The Front'' (1943 film), a 1943 Soviet drama film * ''The Front'', 1976 film Music * The Front (band), an American rock band signed to Columbia Records and active in the 1980s and e ...

— a level of

military formation Military organization or military organisation is the structuring of the armed forces of a state so as to offer such military capability as a national defense policy may require. In some countries paramilitary forces are included in a nation ...

that is equivalent to

army group An army group is a military organization consisting of several field armies, which is self-sufficient for indefinite periods. It is usually responsible for a particular geographic area. An army group is the largest field organization handled by ...

— of the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

Early war service

Тhe Far Eastern Front was created on June 28, 1938 from the Special Red Banner Far Eastern Army within the Far East Military District. It included the

1st Red Banner Army The 1st Red Banner Army () was a Red Army field army of World War II that served in the Soviet Far East. Before 1941 The 1st Army was created in July 1938 under the name of the 1st Coastal Army (or, depending on translation, 1st Maritime Army) i ...

and the

2nd Red Banner Army The 2nd Red Banner Army () was a Soviet field army of World War II that served as part of the Far Eastern Front. The army was formed at Khabarovsk in the Soviet Far East in 1938 as the 2nd Army. After the Far Eastern Front was split in Septembe ...

. In 1938 Front forces — seemingly the Soviet 32nd Rifle Division of 39th Rifle Corps — engaged Japanese

Manchukuo Manchukuo, officially the State of Manchuria prior to 1934 and the Empire of (Great) Manchuria after 1934, was a puppet state of the Empire of Japan in Northeast China, Manchuria from 1932 until 1945. It was founded as a republic in 1932 afte ...

forces at the Battle of Lake Khasan. On the eve of the invasion of the Soviet Union by Germany, the Front comprised: *

26th Rifle Corps 6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and the smallest perfect number. In mathematics Six is the smallest positive integer which is neither a square number nor a prime number; it is the second small ...

*** 21st Rifle Division *** 22nd Rifle Division ***

26th Rifle Division The 26th Rifle Division was a rifle division in the Soviet Red Army during the Russian Civil War, World War II and the Cold War. The division was formed on 3 November 1918 on the Eastern Front (China Border), sent to the Soviet-German Front in Au ...

59th Rifle Corps The 59th Quartermaster Company is a bulk petroleum company designed to provide semi-portable storage for of fuel and to provide distribution of fuel to military units within a specified geographic area while deployed overseas. Its secondary missi ...

*** 39th Rifle Division *** 59th Rifle Division ** 1st, 4th, 5th Rifle Brigades ** 8th Cavalry Division ** One fortified region, artillery, engineers *

** 3rd Rifle Division **

12th Amurskaya Rifle Division The 12th Rifle Division was an infantry division of the Red Army, formed twice. The division's first formation fought in the Russian Civil War and Polish–Soviet War. It was disbanded in 1921. The division formed again in 1923 at Omsk and spent ...

** 59th Tank Division ** 69th Mechanized Division ** One fortified region, artillery, engineers * 15th Army **

18th Rifle Corps 18 (eighteen) is the natural number following 17 and preceding 19. In mathematics * Eighteen is a composite number, its divisors being 1, 2, 3, 6 and 9. Three of these divisors (3, 6 and 9) add up to 18, hence 18 is a semiperfect number. ...

*** 34th Rifle Division *** 202nd Airborne Brigade ** One fortified region, artillery, engineers * 25th Army ** 39th Rifle Corps ***

32nd Rifle Division The 32nd Rifle Division was an infantry division of the Red Army and later of the Soviet Army, formed three times. Interwar period According to the order RVSR number 1086/181 of 25 May 1922, 2nd Saratov separate Infantry Brigade and 81st Infant ...

***

40th Rifle Division The 40th Rifle Division was an infantry division of the Red Army during World War II. It gained the honorific "named for Sergo Ordzhonikidze" on 14 April 1937. It fought in the Battle of Lake Khasan, engagements at Lake Khasan. On 22 June 1941, it ...

*** 92nd Rifle Division ** Five fortified regions, artillery, and engineers * Special Rifle Corps **

79th Rifle Division The 79th Motor Rifle Division was a motorized infantry division of the Soviet Army. It was converted from the 79th Rifle Division in 1957 and inherited the honorific "Sakhalin". The division was awarded the Order of the Red Banner. The 79th Rifle ...

** 101st Mountain Rifle Division * 35th Rifle Division *

66th Rifle Division 066 may refer to: * Air France Flight 066 * Uncial 066 Uncial 066 (in the Biblical manuscript#Gregory-Aland, Gregory-Aland numbering), α 1000 (Biblical manuscript#Von Soden, Soden), is a Greek uncial manuscript of the New Testament. Palaeography, ...

78th Rifle Division The 78th Rifle Division () was an infantry division of the Red Army, formed in 1932, in Novosibirsk, in the Siberian Military District. After being used to provide cadres for new divisions, in September 1939 the division was reformed for the secon ...

* Three fortified regions, artillery, engineers

War against Japan

On August 5, 1945, the Front was divided and reorganized as the 1st Far Eastern Front and 2nd Far Eastern Front:

2nd Far Eastern Front __NOTOC__ The 2nd Far Eastern Front (russian: 2-й Дальневосточный фронт) was a Front—a formation equivalent to a Western Army Group—of the Soviet Army. It was formed just prior to the Soviet invasion of Manchuria and was a ...

, under General M. A. Purkayev (aimed at eastern

), including: *

. * 15th Army. * 16th Army. *

10th Air Army The 10th Air Army was a unit of the Soviet Air Forces during World War II and the Cold War years. World War II The unit was originally formed on Sakhalin Island on August 15, 1942, on the basis of the Air Force of the 25th Army of the Far East ...

1st Far Eastern Front The Far Eastern Front (Russian: Дальневосточный фронт) was a front — a level of military formation that is equivalent to army group — of the Red Army during the Second World War. Early war service Тhe Far Eastern Front was ...

, under Marshal K. A. Meretskov (aimed at northern Manchukuo), including: *

. * 5th Army. * 25th Army. * 35th Army *

9th Air Army The 9th Air Army was a military formation of the Soviet Air Forces, active from August 1942 until April 1957, which operated in the Far East. History It was formed on August 15, 1942 after an order of the NPO of the USSR of July 27, 1942 on the ...

* Chuguevsk Operational Group. * Amur River Flotilla. Transbaikal Front included the

12th Air Army 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. I ...

. In the Soviet invasion of Manchuria it led the attack into Japanese-occupied

Manchuria Manchuria is an exonym (derived from the endo demonym " Manchu") for a historical and geographic region in Northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day Northeast China (Inner Manchuria) and parts of the Russian Far East (Outer Manc ...

. Although the Kwantung Army of the

Imperial Japanese Army The was the official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945. It was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Ministry of the Army, both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emperor o ...

had more than 1 million soldiers, the

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

ese defenders were overwhelmed by the offensive. Allied forces of

Mongolia Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 million, ...

and

Chiang Kai-shek Chiang Kai-shek (31 October 1887 – 5 April 1975), also known as Chiang Chung-cheng and Jiang Jieshi, was a Chinese Nationalist politician, revolutionary, and military leader who served as the leader of the Republic of China (ROC) from 1928 ...

's Nationalist China aided the

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

operation. On August 19, the Far East Front continued its routing of the Kwantung Army by capturing

Harbin Harbin (; mnc, , v=Halbin; ) is a sub-provincial city and the provincial capital and the largest city of Heilongjiang province, People's Republic of China, as well as the second largest city by urban population after Shenyang and largest ...

and

Mukden Shenyang (, ; ; Mandarin pronunciation: ), formerly known as Fengtian () or by its Manchu name Mukden, is a major Chinese sub-provincial city and the provincial capital of Liaoning province. Located in central-north Liaoning, it is the provi ...

. By August 21, the

had captured almost all of

, and the final surrender of the Kwantung Army took place. On August 11 to 12, 1945, the

87th Rifle Corps The 87th Rifle Corps () was a rifle corps of the Red Army during World War II and the Soviet Army in the early years of the Cold War. World War II On 10 July 1945 it comprised 231st and 300th Rifle Divisions as part of 1st Red Banner Army, Ma ...

was brought out from the reserve of the 1st Far Eastern Front, and received new orders to prepare for landing operations on the island of Hokkaido (Japan); however, the planned operation never took place, although elements of the 87th Corps participated in other operations against Japanese forces in the theatre. On September 30, 1945, the Primorskiy (Maritime Provinces) Military District was formed on the territory of Primorsky Krai (territory of the former Ussuri Oblast), from HQ

1st Far East Front First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...

Commanders

* Marshal of the Soviet Union Vasily K. Blukher (1 July – 4 September, 1938) *

Komkor (russian: комкор) is the abbreviation for Corps commander (russian: командир корпуса, komandir korpusa; ), and was a military rank in the Soviet Armed Forces of the USSR in the period from 1935 to 1940. It was also the d ...

Grigori M. Shtern (August 1938; July 1940 – January 1941) *

Colonel General Colonel general is a three- or four-star military rank used in some armies. It is particularly associated with Germany, where historically general officer ranks were one grade lower than in the Commonwealth and the United States, and was a ra ...

Iosif R. Apanasenko romoted to Army General in February 1941(January 1941 – April 1943) * Colonel General Maxim A. Purkaev romoted to Army General in October 1944(April 1943 – August 1945)

Notes

External links

David Glantz David M. Glantz (born January 11, 1942) is an American military historian known for his books on the Red Army during World War II and as the chief editor of ''The Journal of Slavic Military Studies''. Born in Port Chester, New York, Glantz r ...

, ''Stumbling Colossus'', University Press of Kansas, 1998 (for 1941 order of battle) {{Fronts of the Red Army in World War II Far East Front Military units and formations disestablished in 1945 History of the Russian Far East de:1. Fernostfront