On this day in 1941, Nazi Germany and its Axis allies took the Soviet Union by surprise. About 4.5 million troops attacked USSR in Operation Barbarossa. This move would later prove to be the turning point in World War II
Blood-stained pact
The invasion was a violation of a non-aggression pact that Germany had signed with the USSR in 1939. The pact was described by the German leader, Adolf Hitler, as a stain on Germany’s record, according to the BBC.
The troops attacked USSR from German-controlled Poland, Finland and Romania. Within a single week, German forces advanced 200 miles into Soviet territory, destroyed nearly 4,000 aircraft, and killed, captured, or wounded some 600,000 Red Army troops, writes Alan Taylor in the Atlantic
Scorched earth
And in the next six months, Germany occupied the territory that is now Belarus and most of Ukraine. They also surrounded Leningrad (now St Petersburg). Meanwhile Soviet forces destroyed and burnt entire villages under Stalin’s “scorched” earth policy, to prevent supplies falling into German hands, BBC adds.
General Winter wins
Hitler wanted to invade Moscow before Russia’s notorious winter set in, but the troops—already starved—did not even arrive on the outskirts until September. By the end of winter, Germany lost about 7,75,000 men. And Operation Barbarossa, one of the largest invasions, had failed. This was Hitler’s first major defeat on land and it marked the end for Germany