Operation Barbarossa

Operation Barbarossa (German: Unternehmen Barbarossa, named after Frederick I) was the code name for the European Axis invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II. It began on 22 June 1941. More than 3 million men attacked along the 2,900 km front, which made it the largest military invasion in human history. It also involved 600,000 motor vehicles and 750,000 horses.

Operation Barabarossa
Part of the Eastern Front of World War II
Date June 22, 1941 – December 5, 1941 Location Soviet Union Result The Axis conquers huge areas of the Soviet Union and causes heavy losses on the Red Army but fails in its overall strategic goal of defeating the Soviets in a Blitzkrieg campaign.
Belligerents
Germany Romania Finland Italy Hungary Slovakia Croatia	Soviet Union
Commanders and leaders
Adolf Hitler Franz Halder Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb Fedor von Bock Gerd von Rundstedt Ion Antonescu Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim Giovanni Messe	Joseph Stalin Georgy Zhukov Aleksandr Vasilyevskiy Semyon Budyonny Kliment Voroshilov Semyon Timoshenko Markian Popov Fedor Kuznetsov Dmitry Pavlov Ivan Tyulenev
Strength
~3 million 3,600 tanks, 4,389 aircraft 46,000 artillery pieces	~5.7 million 12,000-15,000 tanks, 35,000-40,000 aircraft (11,357 combat ready on 22 June 1941)
Casualties and losses
186,452 killed 40,157 missing 655,179 hurt 2,827 aircraft destroyed 2,735 tanks destroyed	802,191 killed 1,336,147 hurt 2,835,000 captured. 21,200 aircraft destroyed 20,500 tanks lost

In the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact of 1939 Germany and the Soviet Union agreed not to fight each other. Planning for the German surprise attack started in December 1940. The attack was to start on May 15, and its main objective was to destroy the Soviet military power. Some Nazi ideological goals were included, as were Soviet deposits of natural resources, which would be helpful to keep fighting the war against the Allies.

Even though the Soviet Red Army suffered huge losses, the attack did not complete its objectives. The Germans held some of the most important economic areas of the Soviet Union, mainly in Ukraine. However, the Germans were pushed back from Moscow.

The German attack opened the Eastern Front, which in Russia is called the "Great Patriotic War". In the following years Axis powers could not do another attack as large and long as Operation Barbarossa.

Operation Barbarossa Media

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  Barbarossa awakens, 19th-century painting by Hermann Wislicenus in the Imperial Palace of Goslar

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  Plan of new German settlement colonies (marked with dots and diamonds), drawn up by the Friedrich Wilhelm University Institute of Agriculture in Berlin, 1942

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  The geopolitical disposition of Europe in 1941, immediately before the start of Operation Barbarossa. The grey area represents Nazi Germany, its allies, and countries under its control.

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  The Marcks Plan was the original German plan of attack for Operation Barbarossa, as depicted in a US Government study (March 1955).

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  Reichskommissariat Ostland (1942)

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  Reichskommissariat Ukraine (1942)

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  Elements of the German 3rd Panzer Army on the road near Pruzhany, June 1941

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  OKH commander, Field Marshal Walther von Brauchitsch, and Hitler study maps during the early days of Hitler's Soviet Campaign.

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  Semyon Timoshenko and Georgy Zhukov in 1940

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  Army general (later Marshal) Zhukov speaking at a military conference in Moscow, September 1941

Related pages

• Eastern Front (World War II)

Operation Barbarossa was the largest military operation in human history by the number of men involved and by the number of people who died. The operation opened a theatre in which more men were involved than any other in history.