The military rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union was established by a decree of the Soviet Cabinet, the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom), on 22 September 1935. On 20 November, the rank was conferred on five people: People's Commissar of Defence and veteran Bolshevik Kliment Voroshilov, Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army Alexander Yegorov, …

Overview. The rank was first proposed on 26 June 1945. According to Stalin biographer Robert Service, Stalin regretted allowing himself the ostentatious military title and asked Winston Churchill to continue to refer to him as a marshal instead. Stalin rejected any kind of distinctions between his military rank and the other Soviet marshals and kept using the original Marshal of …

Awards and decorations of the Soviet Union are decorations from the former Soviet Union that recognised achievements and personal accomplishments, both military and civilian. Some of the awards, decorations, and orders were discontinued after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, while others are still issued by the Russian Federation as of 2021. Many of the awards were …

The Soviet–Japanese War (Russian: Советско-японская война; Japanese: ソ連対日参戦, romanized: soren tai nichi sansen, lit. 'Soviet Union entry into war against Japan'), known in Mongolia as the Liberation War of 1945 (Mongolian: 1945 оны чөлөөлөх дайн, romanized: 1945 ony chölöölökh dain), was a military conflict within the Second World War ...

The military history of the Soviet Union began in the days following the 1917 October Revolution that brought the Bolsheviks to power. In 1918 the new government formed the Red Army, which then defeated its various internal enemies in the Russian Civil War of 1917–22. The years 1918–21 saw defeats for the Red Army in the Polish–Soviet War (1919–21) and in …

Soviet armored units gained some combat experience during the Battle of Lake Khasan (1938), the Battle of Khalkhin Gol (1939) and the Winter War with Finland (1939–1940). But these operations and also observation of the Spanish Civil War , led People’s Commissar for Defence Marshal Voroshilov to the conclusion that the mechanised corps ...

The highest rank of generalissimus of the Soviet Union (Russian: Генерали́ссимус Сове́тского Сою́за) was created in October 1943, as an individual award to Stalin, the head of state and party chief, and functioned as supreme commander on all Soviet armed forces. Promotion to this rank was limited explicitly to ...

The Soviet–Afghan War (1979–1989) was a nine-year guerrilla war fought by insurgent groups known collectively as the Mujahideen, as well as smaller Maoist groups, against the military occupation of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union and their satellite state, the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA). The conflict lasted throughout the 1980s and fighting took place mostly …

Dmitriy Ustinov – Marshal of the Soviet Union and Minister of Defense of the Soviet Union from 1976 until his death in 1984. Vasily Zaytsev – sniper who killed 225 at the Battle of Stalingrad; his achievements are dramatized in the film Enemy at the Gates. Viktor Zholudev – posthumously awarded for leadership during Operation Bagration

Dmitry Timofeyevich Yazov (Russian: Дми́трий Тимофе́евич Я́зов; 8 November 1924 – 25 February 2020) was a Marshal of the Soviet Union.A veteran of the Great Patriotic War, Yazov served as Minister of Defence from 1987 until he was arrested for his part in the 1991 August Coup, four months before the fall of the Soviet Union.