The Battle of Kursk reaches its largest armored clash

Soviet forces began a major counteroffensive that pushed German troops away from the capital. The victory depended on mass mobilization, strategic reserves, industrial evacuation, and the labor and...

The treaty committed the two states to cooperation against Nazi Germany and to postwar collaboration. It formalized an alliance between political systems with sharply different aims; Stalin sought...

The order forbade unauthorized retreat and created penal units and blocking detachments. It reflected the desperate conditions of the war while subjecting Soviet soldiers to severe coercion...

Soviet forces struck the flanks of German armies around Stalingrad, beginning the encirclement that led to the surrender of the Sixth Army. The battle became a turning point, achieved through the...

The Comintern announced its dissolution during the war, formally recognizing the distinct conditions facing communist parties in different countries. The move also reassured the Allied powers that...

A decree accused the Karachays collectively of collaboration and ordered their removal from the North Caucasus. Families were forced into exile in Central Asia and Siberia; the Karachay autonomous...

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...