WW2 USSR PERSPECTIVE
and encourage engagement): June 22, 1941. 03:15 hours. Operation Barbarossa has begun. Without declaration of war, over 3 million German and Axis troops — supported by more than 3,000 tanks, 2,500–3,000 aircraft, and thousands of artillery pieces — surge across the 2,900-kilometer Soviet western border from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Army Group North strikes from East Prussia into the Baltic republics toward Leningrad. Army Group Center, the main thrust, smashes through Belarus toward Minsk and Smolensk. Army Group South advances into Ukraine toward Kiev. Romanian, Hungarian, Finnish, and Italian forces join in sectors. The Luftwaffe achieves total surprise: in the first hours, waves of bombers and fighters destroy over 1,200 Soviet aircraft on the ground at forward airfields — many still parked wing-to-wing from peacetime routines. By the end of the first day, the figure approaches 1,800–2,000 destroyed, most without ever taking off. Soviet airfields burn; pilots and ground crews di
About WW2 USSR PERSPECTIVE
and encourage engagement): June 22, 1941. 03:15 hours. Operation Barbarossa has begun. Without declaration of war, over 3 million German and Axis troops — supported by more than 3,000 tanks, 2,500–3,000 aircraft, and thousands of artillery pieces — surge across the 2,900-kilometer Soviet western border from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Army Grou...Read more