The deportation of Crimean Tatars begins

The mass operation uprooted tens of thousands from their homes and sent them to special settlements. Many died during transport and exile. Deportation became a tool of territorial control and...

Stalin met with Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill to coordinate Allied strategy, including the opening of a western front. The alliance was essential to defeating Nazi Germany but also...

A decree abolished the Kalmyk Autonomous Republic and ordered the expulsion of the Kalmyk population to Siberia and Central Asia. The state used collective accusations of collaboration to punish a...

NKVD forces began mass deportation of Chechens and Ingush to Central Asia under collective accusations of collaboration. People were forced from their homes in winter; many died during removal and...

The NKVD deported the Balkar population from the North Caucasus to Central Asia and Siberia and abolished the Kabardino-Balkar autonomous arrangement. The date coincided with International Women’s...

Soviet authorities removed Meskhetian Turks and several other borderland communities from southern Georgia to Central Asia. The state cited security concerns and alleged collaboration, but the...

Stalin, Roosevelt, and Churchill negotiated the final campaign against Nazi Germany and postwar arrangements. Agreements on liberated Europe coexisted with Soviet domination in Eastern Europe, where...

The meeting near Torgau symbolized the closing encirclement of Nazi Germany by Allied armies. Soviet and U.S. soldiers celebrated their linkup, even as their governments were already bargaining over...

The parade celebrated the Red Army’s victory and projected Stalin’s authority through a carefully staged public spectacle. It honored immense popular sacrifice while centering the state and military...

The Allied leaders discussed occupation of Germany, postwar borders, and Eastern Europe. U.S. diplomatic records reveal sharp disagreement over elections and political control in countries occupied by...