Series:

Soviet Russian Study of War

2 total works

Cover of The Soviet Strategic Offensive in Manchuria, 1945
This critical examination of the final Soviet strategic offensive operation during World War II seeks to chip away at two generally inaccurate pictures many Westerners have of the war. Specifically, Westerners seem to think that only geography, climate, and sheer numbers negated German military skill and competency on the eastern front, a view that relegates Soviet military accomplishments to oblivion.

Cover of Forgotten Battles of the Soviet-German War, Vol. IV

This volume restores to the historical record those military operations which, for a variety of reasons, previous histories of the war have omitted.

Focusing on the critical period from mid-November 1942 through mid-March 1943, during which the Red Army won its signal victory at Stalingrad and turned the fortunes of war in its favour, this volume describes four major military operations of strategic consequence, which the Red Army conducted during this period, but which, because they failed, neither Soviet nor Western historians have included in previous histories of the war.

These ‘forgotten battles’ include:

  • the Red Army’s offensive code-named Operation Mars, which it conducted against German Army Group Center’s forces defending in the Rzhev-Viaz’ma salient during November and December 1942 and was the companion-piece to the Red Army’s more famous offensive in the Stalingrad region

  • the Red Army’s massive offensive against German Army Group South in the Donbas region during January and February 1943, whose full scope has never been revealed

  • the Red Army’s failed attempt to breach the centre of the Germans’ defensive front during February and March 1943, which Field Marshal Erich von Manstein’s counteroffensive thwarted

  • the Red Army’s Operation ‘Polar Star’, conducted in February 1943 in an attempt to raise the siege of Leningrad and destroy German Army Group North.