Russia marks this Tuesday the 65th anniversary since the start of the counteroffensive in the Battle of Moscow.


Military historians regard the 1941-1942 Battle of Moscow one of the most outstanding operations in the Second World War.

The counteroffensive was launched on December 5 along the front from Kalinin (Tver) to Yelets.

Fierce battles were raging for over 200 days, involving over seven million men and officers as well as 53,000 field guns and mortars, 6,500 tanks and over 3,000 warplanes on both sides.

Despite the absence of superiority in numerical strength and military hardware and despite severe frost and deep snow, troops of the Kalinin and the right wing of the Western fronts broke through the enemy defence south of Kalinin and northwest of Moscow even on the first days, cut off the railway and Kalinin-Moscow highway and liberated several towns and villages.

On December 8, Hitler signed a directive on turning to defence over the entire Soviet-German front. The Center Army Group was given the task to hold to strategically most important areas at any price. On December 9, Soviet troops freed Rogachevo, Yelets and Venev. On December 11 – Stalinogorsk, December 12 – Solnechnogorsk, December 13 – Yefremov, December 15 – Klin and December 20 – Volokolamsk.

Troops of the Bryansk Front in cooperation with troops of the left wing of the Western Front reached the Belev-Mtsensk-Verkhovye line by early January 1942. This move created favorable conditions for encircling the Center Army Group.

Apart from Red Army regulars, 11 divisions of people’s militia participated in the Battle of Moscow. They were engaged in anti-aircraft fighting, put down incendiary bombs, dropped by Nazi planes on Moscow. Later, five such divisions had to be disbanded over heavy losses. But people’s militia held on and defended Moscow from the enemy.

The meeting of the Moscow Soviet of People’s Deputies (held in Moscow on November 6), the historic military parade in the Red Square on November 7 as well as activities of the Russian Orthodox Church played a huge role in raising morals of Soviet people. The church again became a great spiritual force, inspiring people for struggle against invaders.

“The Russian people have withheld such trials and tribulations not for the first time,” said a message by Metropolitan Sergius. “They will blast to smithereens the hostile force this time too with God’s help. Our ancestors didn’t loose heart even under worse conditions, since they thought not of their personal danger, but of the sacred duty to the Fatherland and to the faith and came out victorious.”

“Historians try to resolve up to this time the question of which out of nearly 1,300 operations of the past war was the most important,” said on Monday chief of the Russian General Staff Yuri Baluyevsky, opening a workshop, devoted to the 65th anniversary of the Battle of Moscow.

He noted that on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the V-Day, the then Soviet Defence Minister Georgy Zhukov instructed generals of the General Staff to pinpoint “the most outstanding military operation of the Great Patriotic War, 1941-1945”. They “singled out the 1945 Vistula-Oder operation, during which Soviet troops advanced 500 kilometers in 22 days, but Zhukov disagreed with them, calling the Battle of Moscow as most significant,” Baluyevsky noted.

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