Misplaced Pages

#16983

147-464: Since its creation in 1787 as Łyczakowski Cemetery, it has been the main necropolis of the city's ( at the time named Lemberg) intelligentsia , middle and upper classes . Initially the cemetery was located on several hills in the borough of Lychakiv, following the imperial Austro-Hungarian (the city was located in Austria-Hungary at the time) edict ordering that all cemeteries be moved outside of

294-405: A German helmet appear on the horizon, abandoning their artillery, convoys and all war material to the triumphantly advancing enemy. The Red Guard units are brushed aside like flies. We have no power to stay the enemy; only an immediate signing of the peace treaty will save us from destruction." The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) can be divided into three periods: At the start of the civil war,

441-612: A Polish company which were working in Khmelnytskyi started to redecorate and rebuild the necropolis from its ruins (which was not always legal according to Ukrainian law). Although the Ukrainian authorities tried to stop the works several times, the Poles managed to renovate this important memorial of great Lvovians. Since 1999 there is also a monument to the Sich Riflemen located just outside

588-536: A collective committee of Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko , Pavel Dybenko , and Nikolai Krylenko . At the same time, Nikolay Dukhonin was acting as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief after Alexander Kerensky fled from Russia. On 12 November 1917 the Soviet government appointed Krylenko as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, and because of an "accident" during the forceful displacement of the commander-in-chief, Dukhonin

735-550: A common border between Japanese controlled areas and the Soviet Far East and Mongolia . The Soviets and Japanese, including their respective client states of the Mongolian People's Republic and Manchukuo , disputed the boundaries and accused the other side of border violations. This resulted in a series of escalating border skirmishes and punitive expeditions , including the 1938 Battle of Lake Khasan , and culminated in

882-825: A compromise between belligerents the Polish–Ukrainian War continued until July 1919 when the last UHA forces withdrew east of the River Zbruch . The border on the River Zbruch was confirmed at the Treaty of Warsaw , when in April 1920 Field Marshal Piłsudski signed an agreement with Symon Petlura where it was agreed that in exchange for military support against the Bolsheviks the Ukrainian People's Republic renounced its claims to

1029-655: A first-hand account of the chaotic evacuation of the city by the Austro-Hungarian Army and civilians alike. The town was retaken by Austria-Hungary in June the following year during the Gorlice–Tarnów offensive . Lviv and its population, therefore, suffered greatly during the First World War as many of the offensives were fought across its local geography causing significant collateral damage and disruption. After

1176-418: A further 1,836,000 returned from German captivity. Thus the grand total of losses amounted to 8,668,400. This is the official total dead , but other estimates give the number of total dead up to almost 11 million men, including 7.7 million killed or missing in action and 2.6 million prisoners of war (POW) dead (out of 5.2 million total POWs), plus 400,000 paramilitary and Soviet partisan losses. Officials at

1323-630: A historic scene, as here King John II Casimir made his famous Lwów Oath . On 1 April 1656, during a holy mass in Lviv's Cathedral conducted by the papal legate Pietro Vidoni , John Casimir in a grandiose and elaborate ceremony entrusted the Commonwealth under the Blessed Virgin Mary's protection, whom he announced as The Queen of the Polish Crown and other of his countries . He also swore to protect

1470-498: A hundred times as many tanks . The Red Army, however, had been hindered by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin 's Great Purge of 1937, reducing the army's morale and efficiency shortly before the outbreak of the fighting. With over 30,000 of its army officers executed or imprisoned, most of whom were from the highest ranks, the Red Army in 1939 had many inexperienced senior officers. Because of these factors, and high commitment and morale in

1617-450: A major reshuffling took place in the Soviet military administration. On 13 March 1918, the Soviet government accepted the official resignation of Krylenko and the post of Supreme Commander-in-Chief was liquidated. On 14 March 1918, Leon Trotsky replaced Podvoisky as the Narkom of War Affairs. On 16 March 1918, Pavel Dybenko was relieved from the office of Narkom of Marine Affairs. On 8 May 1918,

SECTION 10

#1732852786017

1764-525: A new area of the cemetery dedicated to the Ukrainian national liberation struggle. The Ukrainian National Army Memorial (Number 8 on the plan) is devoted to the Ukrainian National Army soldiers buried in the cemetery, including soldiers of the SS Division "Galicia" . It was established due to the efforts of Ukrainian national-patriotic organizations and the Ukrainian emigrant veterans' movement. It

1911-615: A new town) in a basin, surrounded it by walls, and replaced the wooden palace by masonry castle – one of the two built by him. The old (Ruthenian) settlement, after it had been rebuilt, became known as the Krakovian Suburb in reference to the city of Kraków . In 1349, the Kingdom of Ruthenia with its capital Lviv was annexed by the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland . The kingdom was transformed into

2058-530: A number of other names . The coat of arms , the banner of the Lviv City Council and the logo, are the officially approved symbols of Lviv. The names or images of architectural and historical monuments are also considered symbols of the city by the Statute of Lviv. Lviv's modern coat of arms is based on the coat of arms from the city seal in the middle of the 14th century—a stone gate with three towers, and in

2205-603: A pro-German orientation were closed. After the revolutions of 1848 , the language of instruction at the university shifted from German to include Ukrainian and Polish. Around that time, a certain sociolect developed in the city known as the Lwów dialect . Considered to be a type of Polish dialect, it draws its roots from numerous other languages besides Polish. In 1853, kerosene lamps as street lighting were introduced by Ignacy Łukasiewicz and Jan Zeh. Then in 1858, these were updated to gas lamps , and in 1900 to electric ones . After

2352-694: A significant centre for Eastern Orthodoxy with the establishment of an Orthodox brotherhood, a Greek-Slavonic school, and a printer which published the first full versions of the Bible in Church Slavonic in 1580. A Jesuit Collegium was founded in 1608, and on 20 January 1661 King John II Casimir of Poland issued a decree granting it "the honour of the academy and the title of the university". The 17th century brought invading armies of Swedes , Hungarians , Turks , Russians and Cossacks to its gates. In 1648 an army of Cossacks and Crimean Tatars besieged

2499-540: A stable nucleus. By 1925, this system provided 46 of the 77 infantry divisions and one of the eleven cavalry divisions. The remainder consisted of regular officers and enlisted personnel serving two-year terms. The territorial system was finally abolished, with all remaining formations converted to the other cadre divisions, in 1937–1938. The Soviet military received ample funding and was innovative in its technology. An American journalist wrote in 1941: Even in American terms

2646-509: A surrender the following day although some Japanese units continued to fight for several more days. A proposed Soviet invasion of Hokkaido , the second largest Japanese island, was originally planned to be part of the territory to be taken but it was cancelled. Military administration after the October Revolution was taken over by the People's Commissariat of War and Marine affairs headed by

2793-647: A thoroughly rebuilt form. The town was inherited by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1340 and ruled by voivode Dmytro Dedko , the favourite of the Lithuanian prince Liubartas , until 1349. The city and region was a destination of 50,000 Armenians fleeing from the Saljuq and Mongol invasions of Armenia. During the wars over the succession of Galicia-Volhynia Principality in 1339 King Casimir III of Poland undertook an expedition and conquered Lviv in 1340, burning down

2940-570: Is 296 metres (971 feet) above sea level . Its highest point is the Vysokyi Zamok ( High Castle ), 409 meters (1,342 feet) above sea level . This castle has a commanding view of the historic city centre with its distinctive green-domed churches and intricate architecture. The old walled city was at the foothills of the High Castle on the banks of the Poltva River . In the 13th century, the river

3087-896: Is 745 mm (29 in) with the maximum in summer. Mean sunshine duration per year at Lviv is about 1,804 hours. [REDACTED] Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia c. 1250–1340 [REDACTED] Kingdom of Poland 1340–1569 [REDACTED] Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth 1569–1772 [REDACTED] Austrian Empire / A-H Empire 1772–1914 [REDACTED] Russian Empire 1914–1915 ( occupation ) [REDACTED] Austro-Hungarian Empire 1915–1918 [REDACTED] West Ukrainian People's Republic 1918 [REDACTED] Poland (Second Republic) 1918–1939 [REDACTED]   Soviet Union ( Ukrainian SSR ) 1939–1941 ( occupation ) [REDACTED]   Nazi Germany 1941–1944 ( occupation ) [REDACTED]   Soviet Union ( Ukrainian SSR ) 1944–1991 [REDACTED]   Ukraine 1991– present Archaeologists have demonstrated that

SECTION 20

#1732852786017

3234-581: Is also the home of many cultural institutions, including a philharmonic orchestra and the Lviv Theatre of Opera and Ballet . The city of Lviv is also historically known by different names in other languages – Polish : Lwów [lvuf] ; German : Lemberg [ˈlɛmbɛʁk] or (archaic) Leopoldstadt [ˈleːopɔltˌʃtat] ; Yiddish : לעמבעריק , romanized :  Lemberik ; Russian : Львов , romanized :  Lvov [lʲvof] ; as well as

3381-566: Is on the UNESCO World Heritage List ; however, it has been listed as an endangered site due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine . Due to the city's Mediterranean aura, many Soviet movies set in places like Venice or Rome were actually shot in Lviv. In 1991 , Lviv became part of the independent nation of Ukraine. The city has many industries and institutions of higher education , such as Lviv University and Lviv Polytechnic . Lviv

3528-589: Is only one way to prevent the restoration of the police, and that is to create a people's militia and to fuse it with the army (the standing army to be replaced by the arming of the entire people)." At the time, the Imperial Russian Army had started to collapse. Approximately 23% (about 19 million) of the male population of the Russian Empire were mobilized; however, most of them were not equipped with any weapons and had support roles such as maintaining

3675-583: Is recognised by Poland that ethnographical conditions necessitate an autonomous regime in the Eastern part of Galicia ." This provision was never honoured by the interwar Polish government . After 1923, the region was internationally recognized as part of the Polish state. During the interwar period Lviv was the Second Polish Republic 's third-most populous city (following Warsaw and Łódź ), and it became

3822-576: The Cheka secret police. Conscription began in June 1918, and opposition to it was violently suppressed. To control the multi-ethnic and multi-cultural Red Army soldiery, the Cheka operated special punitive brigades which suppressed anti-communists , deserters , and " enemies of the state ". The Red Army used special regiments for ethnic minorities, such as the Dungan Cavalry Regiment commanded by

3969-614: The Dungan Magaza Masanchi . It also co-operated with armed Bolshevik Party-oriented volunteer units, the Forces of Special Purpose from 1919 to 1925. The slogan "exhortation, organization, and reprisals" expressed the discipline and motivation which helped ensure the Red Army's tactical and strategic success. On campaign, the attached Cheka special punitive brigades conducted summary field court-martial and executions of deserters and slackers. Under Commissar Yan Karlovich Berzin ,

4116-530: The Gulag . During the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army conscripted 29,574,900 men in addition to the 4,826,907 in service at the beginning of the war. Of this total of 34,401,807 it lost 6,329,600 killed in action (KIA), 555,400 deaths by disease and 4,559,000 missing in action (MIA) (most captured). Of the 4.5 million missing, 939,700 rejoined the ranks in the subsequently liberated Soviet territory, and

4263-907: The Imperial Japanese Army ), the doctrine was not used. Only in the Second World War did deep operations come into play. The Red Army was involved in armed conflicts in the Republic of China during the Sino-Soviet conflict (1929) , the Soviet invasion of Xinjiang (1934), when it was assisted by White Russian forces, and the Islamic rebellion in Xinjiang (1937) in Northwestern China . The Red Army achieved its objectives; it maintained effective control over

4410-650: The Lwów Eaglets young militia volunteers, after whom that part of the cemetery is named. It was one of the most famous necropolises of the interwar Poland . Lviv was a city in interwar Poland and at the time named Lwów. In 1925, the ashes of one of the unknown defenders of Lwów were transferred to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Warsaw . After that was built the «Polish mausoleum» (Lwów Eaglets Memorial). After World War II

4557-598: The Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine led by Nestor Makhno , the anti-White and anti-Red Green armies , efforts to restore the defeated Provisional Government, monarchists, but mainly the White Movement of several different anti-socialist military confederations. "Red Army Day", 23 February 1918, has a two-fold historical significance: it was the first day of conscription (in Petrograd and Moscow), and

Lychakiv Cemetery - Misplaced Pages Continue

4704-643: The Royal elections in Poland , alongside other major cities such as Kraków , Poznań , Warsaw or Gdańsk . During the 17th century, it was the second largest city of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth , with a population of about 30,000. In 1572, one of the first publishers of books in what is now Ukraine, Ivan Fedorov , a graduate of the University of Kraków , settled here for a brief period. The city became

4851-610: The Soviet Union to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic . The majority of the surviving pre-war inhabitants of the city were expelled to the former German areas awarded to Poland after the Yalta Conference . This started a period of devastation of historical monuments located at the cemetery. Up to 1971 many of the sculptures were destroyed. However, in 1975 the cemetery was declared a historical monument and

4998-602: The Soviet invasion of Manchuria on 9 August 1945 (three days after the first atomic bombing of Hiroshima and the same day the second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki , while also being exact three months after the surrender of Germany). It was the largest campaign of the Soviet–Japanese War , which resumed hostilities between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the Empire of Japan after almost six years of peace following

5145-498: The Union of Active Struggle . Two years later, the paramilitary organisation, called the Riflemen's Association , was also founded in the city by Polish activists. At the same time, Lviv became the city where famous Ukrainian writers (such as Ivan Franko , Panteleimon Kulish and Ivan Nechuy-Levytsky ) published their work. It was a centre of Ukrainian cultural revival. The city also housed

5292-948: The United States . In total, the U.S. deliveries to the USSR through Lend-Lease amounted to $ 11 billion in materials ($ 180 billion in the 2020 money value): over 400,000 jeeps and trucks; 12,000 armored vehicles (including 7,000 tanks, about 1,386 of which were M3 Lees and 4,102 M4 Shermans ); 14,015 aircraft (of which 4,719 were Bell P-39 Airacobras , 2,908 were Douglas A-20 Havocs and 2,400 were Bell P-63 Kingcobras ) and 1.75 million tons of food. Soviet soldiers committed mass rapes in occupied territories, especially in Germany . The wartime rapes were followed by decades of silence. According to historian Antony Beevor , whose books were banned in 2015 from some Russian schools and colleges, NKVD (Soviet secret police) files have revealed that

5439-609: The Wehrmacht in combat. The Axis's numeric superiority rendered the combatants' divisional strength approximately equal. A generation of Soviet commanders (notably Georgy Zhukov ) learned from the defeats, and Soviet victories in the Battle of Moscow , at Stalingrad , Kursk and later in Operation Bagration proved decisive. In 1941, the Soviet government raised the bloodied Red Army's esprit de corps with propaganda stressing

5586-502: The Wehrmacht was especially harsh. Per a 1941 Stalin directive , Red Army officers and soldiers were to "fight to the last" rather than surrender; Stalin stated: "There are no Soviet prisoners of war, only traitors". During and after World War II freed POWs went to special " filtration camps ". Of these, by 1944, more than 90% were cleared, and about 8% were arrested or condemned to serve in penal battalions . In 1944, they were sent directly to reserve military formations to be cleared by

5733-578: The brigade and regimental levels. The commissars also had the task of spying on commanders for political incorrectness . In August 1918, Trotsky authorized General Mikhail Tukhachevsky to place blocking units behind politically unreliable Red Army units, to shoot anyone who retreated without permission. In 1942, during the Great Patriotic War (1941–1945) Joseph Stalin reintroduced the blocking policy and penal battalions with Order 227 . The Soviet westward offensive of 1918–1919 occurred at

5880-597: The collapse of the Habsburg Monarchy at the end of the First World War, Lviv became an arena of battle between the local Polish population and the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen . Both nations perceived the city as an integral part of their new statehoods which at that time were forming in the former Austrian territories. On the night of 31 October – 1 November 1918 the Western Ukrainian People's Republic

6027-474: The lines of communication and the base areas. The Tsarist general Nikolay Dukhonin estimated that there had been 2 million deserters, 1.8 million dead, 5 million wounded and 2 million prisoners. He estimated the remaining troops as numbering 10 million. While the Imperial Russian Army was being taken apart, "it became apparent that the rag-tag Red Guard units and elements of

Lychakiv Cemetery - Misplaced Pages Continue

6174-465: The old princely castle . Poland ultimately gained control over Lviv and the adjacent region in 1349. From then on the population was subjected to attempts to both Polonize and Catholicize the population. The Lithuanians ravaged Lviv land in 1351 during the Halych-Volhyn Wars with Lviv being plundered and destroyed by duke Liubartas in 1353. Casimir built a new city center (or founded

6321-497: The "Second Soviet-Finnish War") which was a conflict fought by Finland and Germany against the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1944. In accordance with the Soviet-Nazi Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 23 August 1939, the Red Army invaded Poland on 17 September 1939, after the Nazi invasion on 1 September 1939. On 30 November, the Red Army also attacked Finland, in the Winter War of 1939–1940. By autumn 1940, after conquering its portion of Poland, Nazi Germany shared an extensive border with

6468-417: The 1929 Field Regulations and became codified in the 1936 Provisional Field Regulations (PU-36). The Great Purge of 1937–1939 and the 1941 Red Army Purge removed many leading officers from the Red Army, including Tukhachevsky himself and many of his followers, and the doctrine was abandoned. Thus, at the Battle of Lake Khasan in 1938 and in the Battle of Khalkhin Gol in 1939 ( major border conflicts with

6615-411: The 1932–1939 Soviet–Japanese border conflicts . The Red Army, with support from Mongolian forces, overwhelmed the Japanese Kwantung Army and local Chinese forces supporting them. The Soviets advanced on the continent into the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo , Mengjiang (the northeast section of present-day Inner Mongolia which was part of another puppet state) and via an amphibious operation

6762-408: The All-Russian Chief Headquarters was created, headed by Nikolai Stogov and later Alexander Svechin . On 2 September 1918, the Revolutionary Military Council (RMC) was established as the main military administration under Leon Trotsky, the Narkom of War Affairs. On 6 September 1918 alongside the chief headquarters, the Field Headquarters of RMC was created, initially headed by Nikolai Rattel . On

6909-476: The Austrian part of the Dual Monarchy, but the Galician Sejm and provincial administration, both established in Lviv, had extensive privileges and prerogatives, especially in education, culture, and local affairs. In 1894, the General National Exhibition was held in Lviv. The city started to grow rapidly, becoming the fourth largest in Austria-Hungary, according to the census of 1910. Many Belle Époque public edifices and tenement houses were erected, with many of

7056-455: The Bolshevik Revolution took place there were few machines in Russia. Marx said Communism must come in a highly industrialized society. The Bolsheviks identified their dreams of socialist happiness with machines which would multiply production and reduce hours of labour until everyone would have everything he needed and would work only as much as he wished. Somehow this has not come about, but the Russians still worship machines, and this helped make

7203-465: The City of Lwów (since 1891), the Polish Copernicus Society of Naturalists , the Polish Historical Society , Lwów University , with Polish as the official language since 1882, the Lwów Scientific Society , the Lwów Art Gallery , the Polish Theatre , and the Polish Archdiocese . Furthermore, Lviv was the centre of a number of Polish independence organisations. In June 1908, Józef Piłsudski , Władysław Sikorski and Kazimierz Sosnkowski founded here

7350-449: The Crown was transformed into the Ruthenian Voivodeship . In 1444, the city was granted the staple right , which resulted in its growing prosperity and wealth, as it became one of the major trading centres on the merchant routes between Central Europe and Black Sea region. It was also transformed into one of the main fortresses of the kingdom. As one of the largest and most influential royal cities of Poland, it enjoyed voting rights in

7497-403: The Defenders of Lwów (Cemetery of Eaglets, Polish : Cmentarz Orląt Lwowskich ) is a memorial and a burial place for the Poles and their allies who died in Lviv during the hostilities of the Polish-Ukrainian War (1918−1919) and Polish-Soviet War (1919−1921). The complex is a part of the city's historic Lychakiv Cemetery. There are about 3000 graves in that part of the cemetery; some from

SECTION 50

#1732852786017

7644-451: The Eastern Front consisted of an estimated 3,604,800 KIA/MIA within the 1937 borders plus 900,000 ethnic Germans and Austrians outside the 1937 border (included in these numbers are men listed as missing in action or unaccounted for after the war) and 3,576,300 men reported captured (total 8,081,100); the losses of the German satellites on the Eastern Front approximated 668,163 KIA/MIA and 799,982 captured (total 1,468,145). Of these 9,549,245,

7791-408: The Finnish forces, Finland was able to resist the Soviet invasion for much longer than the Soviets expected. Finnish forces inflicted stunning losses on the Red Army for the first three months of the war while suffering very few losses themselves. Hostilities ceased in March 1940 with the signing of the Moscow Peace Treaty . Finland ceded 9% of its pre-war territory and 30% of its economic assets to

7938-474: The Jewish and Ukrainian quarters of the city, killing approximately 340 civilians (see: Lwów pogrom ). The retreating Ukrainian forces besieged the city. The Sich riflemen reformed into the Ukrainian Galician Army (UHA). The Polish forces aided from central Poland, including General Haller's Blue Army , equipped by the French, relieved the besieged city in May 1919 forcing the UHA to the east. Despite Entente mediation attempts to cease hostilities and reach

8085-439: The Kingdom's folk from any impositions and unjust bondage . Two years later, John Casimir, in honor of the bravery of its residents, declared Lviv to be equal to two historic capitals of the Commonwealth, Kraków and Vilnius . In the same year, 1658, Pope Alexander VII declared the city to be Semper fidelis , in recognition of its key role in defending Europe and Roman Catholicism from the Ottoman Muslim invasion. In 1672 it

8232-514: The Lviv area was settled by the fifth century, with the gord at Chernecha Hora -Voznesensk Street in Lychakivskyi District attributed to White Croats . The city of Lviv was founded in 1250 by King Daniel of Galicia (1201–1264) in the Principality of Halych of Kingdom of Ruthenia . It was named in honor of his son Lev as Lvihorod which is consistent with names of other Ukrainian cities, such as Myrhorod , Sharhorod , Novhorod , Bilhorod , Horodyshche , and Horodok . Earlier there

8379-415: The Lychakiv Cemetery, according to the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church 's Military Chaplaincy Center. The Lviv Oblast Council announced on May 20, 2022 that it would hold an architectural contest in order to select the design for a war memorial at the site, which has been described as part of the decommunization process in Ukraine . On August 19, 2022, Lviv authorities approved the exhumation of

8526-399: The Manchurian Chinese Eastern Railway , and successfully installed a pro-Soviet regime in Xinjiang . The Soviet–Japanese border conflicts , also known as the "Soviet–Japanese Border War" or the first "Soviet–Japanese War", was a series of minor and major conflicts fought between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan from 1932 to 1939. Japan's expansion into Northeast China created

8673-418: The NKVD. Further, in 1945, about 100 filtration camps were set for repatriated POWs, and other displaced persons , which processed more than 4,000,000 people. By 1946, 80% civilians and 20% of POWs were freed, 5% of civilians, and 43% of POWs were re-drafted, 10% of civilians and 22% of POWs were sent to labor battalions, and 2% of civilians and 15% of the POWs (226,127 out of 1,539,475 total) were transferred to

8820-421: The Polish mausoleum. Since the fall of communism , the cemetery had been rebuilt and refurbished. It was finally reopened on 24 June 2005. In the back part of the cemetery (No. 6 on the plan) on a separate field indicated original steel crosses, located «1863 rebels' hill». Buried here are members Polish January Uprising of 1863 , of which a member of the Polish Central National Committee Bronisław Szwarce ,

8967-421: The Red Army consisted of 299 infantry regiments . The civil war intensified after Lenin dissolved the Russian Constituent Assembly (5–6 January 1918) and the Soviet government signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918), removing Russia from the First World War. Freed from international obligations, the Red Army confronted an internecine war against a variety of opposing anti-Bolshevik forces, including

SECTION 60

#1732852786017

9114-404: The Red Army during World War II, 8 million of which were non-Slavic minorities. Officially, the Red Army lost 6,329,600 killed in action (KIA), 555,400 deaths by disease and 4,559,000 missing in action (MIA) ( mostly captured ). The majority of the losses, excluding POWs, were ethnic Russians (5,756,000), followed by ethnic Ukrainians (1,377,400). Of the 4.5 million missing, 939,700 rejoined

9261-460: The Red Army finally achieving a Soviet-Mongolian victory over Japan and Manchukuo at the Battles of Khalkhin Gol in September 1939. The Soviet Union and Japan agreed to a ceasefire. Later the two sides signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact on 13 April 1941, which resolved the dispute and returned the borders to status quo ante bellum . The Winter War ( Finnish : talvisota , Swedish : finska vinterkriget , Russian: Зи́мняя война́ )

9408-445: The Red Army instituted amnesty weeks to prohibit punitive measures against desertion which encouraged the voluntary return of 98,000–132,000 deserters to the army. In September 1918, the Bolshevik militias consolidated under the supreme command of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic ( Russian : Революционный Военный Совет , romanized :  Revolyutsionny Voyenny Sovyet (Revvoyensoviet) ). The first chairman

9555-481: The Red Army numbered some 6.5 million men, many of whom the Army had difficulty supporting, around 581,000 in the two operational fronts, western and southwestern. Around 2.5 million men and women were mobilized in the interior as part of reserve armies. The XI Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) (RCP (b)) adopted a resolution on the strengthening of the Red Army. It decided to establish strictly organized military, educational and economic conditions in

9702-483: The Red Army's defeat of Pyotr Wrangel in the south in 1920 allowed the foundation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in December 1922. Historian John Erickson sees 1 February 1924, when Mikhail Frunze became head of the Red Army staff, as marking the ascent of the general staff , which came to dominate Soviet military planning and operations. By 1 October 1924 the Red Army's strength had diminished to 530,000. The list of Soviet divisions 1917–1945 details

9849-411: The Red Army's strength was 401 divisions. The Soviet forces were apparently unprepared despite numerous warnings from a variety of sources. They suffered much damage in the field because of mediocre officers, partial mobilization, and an incomplete reorganization. The hasty pre-war forces expansion and the over-promotion of inexperienced officers (owing to the purging of experienced officers) favored

9996-473: The Russian Central Defense Ministry Archive (CDMA) maintain that their database lists the names of roughly 14 million dead and missing service personnel. The majority of the losses, excluding POWs, were ethnic Russians (5,756,000), followed by ethnic Ukrainians (1,377,400). As many as 8 million of the 34 million mobilized were non-Slavic minority soldiers, and around 45 divisions formed from national minorities served from 1941 to 1943. The German losses on

10143-408: The Ruthenian domain of the Crown with Lviv as the capital. On 17 June 1356 King Casimir III the Great granted it Magdeburg rights , which implied that all city matters were to be resolved by a council elected by the wealthy citizens. In 1362, the High Castle was completely rebuilt with stone replacing the previous wood. In 1358, the city became a seat of Roman Catholic Archdiocese , which initiated

10290-518: The Soviet Union made Red Army logistical support difficult because many depots (and most of the USSR's industrial manufacturing base) lay in the country's invaded western areas, obliging their re-establishment east of the Ural Mountains. Lend-Lease trucks and jeeps from the United States began appearing in large numbers in 1942. Until then, the Red Army was often required to improvise or go without weapons, vehicles, and other equipment. The 1941 decision to physically move their manufacturing capacity east of

10437-421: The Soviet Union. In June 1918, Leon Trotsky abolished workers' control over the Red Army, replacing the election of officers with traditional army hierarchies and criminalizing dissent with the death penalty . Simultaneously, Trotsky carried out a mass recruitment of officers from the old Imperial Russian Army , who were employed as military advisors ( voenspetsy ). The Bolsheviks occasionally enforced

10584-577: The Soviet Union. Soviet losses on the front were heavy, and the country's international reputation suffered. The Soviet forces did not accomplish their objective of the total conquest of Finland but did receive territory in Karelia , Petsamo , and Salla . The Finns retained their sovereignty and improved their international reputation, which bolstered their morale in the Continuation War (also known as

10731-436: The Soviet defence budget was large. In 1940 it was the equivalent of $ 11,000,000,000, and represented one-third of the national expenditure. Measure this against the fact that the infinitely richer United States will approximate the expenditure of that much yearly only in 1942 after two years of its greatest defence effort. Most of the money spent on the Red Army and Air Force went for machines of war. Twenty-three years ago when

10878-585: The Soviets released 3,572,600 from captivity after the war, thus the grand total of the Axis losses came to an estimated 5,976,645. Regarding POWs, both sides captured large numbers and had many die in captivity – one recent British figure says 3.6 of 6 million Soviet POWs died in German camps, while 300,000 of 3 million German POWs died in Soviet hands. In 1941, the rapid progress of the initial German air and land attacks into

11025-654: The USSR, with whom it remained neutrally bound by their non-aggression pact and trade agreements . Another consequence of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina , carried out by the Southern Front in June–July 1940 and Soviet occupation of the Baltic states . These conquests also added to the border the Soviet Union shared with Nazi-controlled areas. For Adolf Hitler ,

11172-479: The Ural Mountains kept the main Soviet support system out of German reach. In the later stages of the war, the Red Army fielded some excellent weaponry, especially artillery and tanks. The Red Army's heavy KV-1 and medium T-34 tanks outclassed most Wehrmacht armor, but in 1941 most Soviet tank units used older and inferior models. The Red Army was financially and materially assisted in its wartime effort by

11319-473: The Yanivskiy Cemetery ( Polish : cmentarz Janowski ), with many working class graves and the adjacent New Jewish Cemetery. Lychakivskiy Cemetery was used by all Christian sects in the city: in addition to Roman Catholics , it also included Eastern Rite Catholics , Protestants and Orthodox . After World War II the city ( at the time named Lwów) was annexed (from the Second Polish Republic ) by

11466-464: The above organizations." In the event of an entire unit wanting to join the Red Army, a "collective guarantee and the affirmative vote of all its members would be necessary." Because the Red Army was composed mainly of peasants, the families of those who served were guaranteed rations and assistance with farm work. Some peasants who remained at home yearned to join the Army; men, along with some women, flooded

11613-430: The administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion , and is one of the main cultural centres of Ukraine . Lviv also hosts the administration of Lviv urban hromada . It was named after Leo I of Galicia , the eldest son of Daniel , King of Ruthenia . Lviv emerged as the centre of the historical regions of Red Ruthenia and Galicia in the 14th century , superseding Halych , Chełm , Belz , and Przemyśl . It

11760-621: The army. However, it was recognized that an army of 1,600,000 would be burdensome. By the end of 1922, after the Congress, the Party Central Committee decided to reduce the Red Army to 800,000. This reduction necessitated the reorganization of the Red Army's structure. The supreme military unit became corps of two or three divisions. Divisions consisted of three regiments. Brigades as independent units were abolished. The formation of departments' rifle corps began. After four years of warfare,

11907-566: The beginning of its existence, the Red Army functioned as a voluntary formation, without ranks or insignia. Democratic elections selected the officers. However, a decree on 29 May 1918 imposed obligatory military service for men of ages 18 to 40. To service the massive draft, the Bolsheviks formed regional military commissariats ( voyennyy komissariat , abbr. voyenkomat ), which as of 2023 still exist in Russia in this function and under this name. Military commissariats, however, should not be confused with

12054-472: The brigades took hostages from the villages of deserters to compel their surrender; one in ten of those returning was executed. The same tactic also suppressed peasant rebellions in areas controlled by the Red Army, the biggest of these being the Tambov Rebellion . The Soviets enforced the loyalty of the various political, ethnic, and national groups in the Red Army through political commissars attached at

12201-726: The buildings from the Austrian period, such as the Lviv Theatre of Opera and Ballet , built in the Viennese neo-Renaissance style. At that time, Lviv was home to a number of renowned Polish-language institutions, such as the Ossolineum , with the second-largest collection of Polish books in the world, the Polish Academy of Arts , the National Museum (since 1908), the Historical Museum of

12348-703: The capital of the West Ukrainian People's Republic . Between the wars, the city was the centre of the Lwów Voivodeship in the Second Polish Republic . After the German-Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939, Lviv was annexed by the Soviet Union . The once-large Jewish community of the city was murdered in large numbers by the Nazis and during the Holocaust . For decades there was no working synagogue in Lviv after

12495-479: The cemetery of Lwów Eaglets was completely destroyed and turned into a truck depot and at one time Eaglets Cemetery was damaged with a bulldozer. Due to the history of complex Polish-Ukrainian relations , the Polish Eaglets Cemetery was neglected because the Ukrainian authorities did not want to rebuild this monument of young Polish soldiers defending the city in 1920s. Though in the late 1980s, workers of

12642-665: The circumstance was no dilemma, because the Drang nach Osten ("Drive towards the East") policy secretly remained in force, culminating on 18 December 1940 with Directive No. 21, Operation Barbarossa , approved on 3 February 1941, and scheduled for mid-May 1941. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, in Operation Barbarossa, the Red Army's ground forces had 303 divisions and 22 separate brigades (5.5 million soldiers) including 166 divisions and brigades (2.6 million) garrisoned in

12789-456: The city limits. The original project was prepared by Karol Bauer  [ pl ] , the head of the Lviv University botanical garden . In mid-1850s the cemetery was expanded significantly by Tytus Tchórzewski, who created the present network of alleys and round-abouts. It then became the main city cemetery, and soon most other cemeteries were closed. The two largest that remained were

12936-658: The city's population was Roman Catholics , 28% Jews, and 19% belonged to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church . Linguistically, 86% of the city's population used the Polish language and 11% preferred Ruthenian . In 1773, the first newspaper in Lemberg, Gazette de Leopoli , began to be published. In 1784, a Latin language university was opened with lectures in German , Polish and even Ruthenian ; after closing in 1805, it

13083-797: The city's population). In 1772, following the First Partition of Poland , the region was annexed by the Habsburg monarchy to the Austrian Partition . Known in German as Lemberg , the city became the capital of the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria . Lemberg grew dramatically during the 19th century, increasing in population from approximately 30,000 at the time of the Austrian annexation in 1772, to 196,000 by 1910 and to 212,000 three years later; rapid population growth brought about an increase in urban squalor and poverty in Austrian Galicia . In

13230-669: The city) lay outside the territory of Poland and that Poland did not have the mandate to establish administrative control in that country, and that Poland was merely the occupying military power of Galicia (as a whole ), whose sovereign remained the Allied Powers and fate would be determined by the Council of Ambassadors at the League of Nations. On 14 March 1923, the Council of Ambassadors decided that Galicia would be incorporated into Poland "whereas it

13377-610: The defense "of the Soviet authority, the creation of a basis for the transformation of the standing army into a force deriving its strength from a nation in arms, and, furthermore, the creation of a basis for the support of the coming Socialist Revolution in Europe." Enlistment was conditional upon "guarantees being given by a military or civil committee functioning within the territory of the Soviet Power, or by party or trade union committees or, in extreme cases, by two persons belonging to one of

13524-532: The defense of Motherland and nation, employing historic exemplars of Russian courage and bravery against foreign aggressors. The anti-Nazi Great Patriotic War was conflated with the Patriotic War of 1812 against Napoleon , and historical Russian military heroes, such as Alexander Nevsky and Mikhail Kutuzov , appeared. Repression of the Russian Orthodox Church temporarily ceased, and priests revived

13671-423: The degradation ended. Since the late 1980s , the cemetery has seen constant rebuilding and refurbishment and continues to be one of the principal tourist attractions of Lviv . In late 2006 the city administration announced plans to transfer the tombs of Stepan Bandera , Yevhen Konovalets , Andriy Melnyk and other key leaders of Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) / Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) to

13818-499: The depth of the enemy's ground forces, inducing catastrophic defensive failure. The deep-battle doctrine relies upon aviation and armor advances with the expectation that maneuver warfare offers quick, efficient, and decisive victory. Marshal Tukhachevsky said that aerial warfare must be "employed against targets beyond the range of infantry , artillery , and other arms. For maximum tactical effect aircraft should be employed en masse , concentrated in time and space, against targets of

13965-439: The famous zoologist Benedykt Dybowski , cornet Vitebsk land , resting under the central monument rebels Shimon Vizunas Shidlovsky , etc. There are also numerous parts of the cemetery in which veterans of most wars of 19th and 20th centuries are buried, including the quarters of veterans of: Since the city for centuries used to be a centre of Polish culture, there are numerous famous Poles buried there. Among them are: Among

14112-460: The final one was closed by the Soviets . The greater part of the once-predominant Polish population was sent to Poland during a population exchange between Poland and Soviet Ukraine in 1944–46. The historical heart of the city, with its cobblestone streets and architectural assortment of Renaissance , Baroque , Neo-classicism and Art Nouveau , survived Soviet and German occupations during World War II largely unscathed. The historic city centre

14259-634: The first day of combat against the occupying Imperial German Army . The Red Army controlled by the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic also against independence movements, invading and annexing newly independent states of the former Russian Empire. This included three military campaigns against the army of the Ukrainian People's Republic , in January–February 1918, January–February 1919, and May–October 1920. Conquered nations were subsequently incorporated into

14406-561: The formations of the Red Army in that time. In the late 1920s and throughout the 1930s, Soviet military theoreticians – led by Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky – developed the deep operation doctrine, a direct consequence of their experiences in the Polish–Soviet War and in the Russian Civil War. To achieve victory, deep operations envisage simultaneous corps - and army-size unit maneuvers of simultaneous parallel attacks throughout

14553-453: The highest tactical importance." "To the Red army, Stalin has dealt a fearful blow. As a result of the latest judicial frameup, it has fallen several cubits in stature. The interests of the Soviet defense have been sacrificed in the interests of the self-preservation of the ruling clique." Trotsky on the Red Army purges of 1937. Red Army deep operations found their first formal expression in

14700-593: The hundreds of thousands, and possibly as many as two million. While the Soviets considered the surrender of Germany to be the end of the "Great Patriotic War", at the earlier Yalta Conference the Soviet Union agreed to enter the Pacific Theater portion of World War II within three months of the end of the war in Europe . This promise was reaffirmed at the Potsdam Conference held in July 1945. The Red Army began

14847-484: The imperial army who had gone over the side of the Bolsheviks were quite inadequate to the task of defending the new government against external foes." Therefore, the Council of People's Commissars decided to form the Red Army on 28 January 1918. They envisioned a body "formed from the class-conscious and best elements of the working classes." All citizens of the Russian republic aged 18 or older were eligible. Its role being

14994-426: The institution of military political commissars . In the mid-1920s, the territorial principle of manning the Red Army was introduced. In each region, able-bodied men were called up for a limited period of active duty in territorial units, which constituted about half the army's strength, each year, for five years. The first call-up period was for three months, with one month a year thereafter. A regular cadre provided

15141-632: The largest land force in the Allied victory in the European theatre of World War II , and its invasion of Manchuria assisted the unconditional surrender of Imperial Japan . During its operations on the Eastern Front , it accounted for 75–80% of the casualties that the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS suffered during the war, and ultimately captured the German capital, Berlin . Up to 34 million soldiers served in

15288-954: The largest and most influential Ukrainian institutions in the world, including the Prosvita society dedicated to spreading literacy in the Ukrainian language, the Shevchenko Scientific Society , the Dniester Insurance Company and base of the Ukrainian cooperative movement , and it served as the seat of the Ukrainian Catholic Church . However, the Polish-dominated city council blocked Ukrainian attempts to create visible monumets for their own. The most important streets had names referring to Polish history and literature, and only minor roads referred to Ukrainians. Lviv

15435-454: The late 18th and early 19th centuries a large influx of Austrians and German-speaking Czech bureaucrats gave the city a character that by the 1840s was quite Austrian, in its orderliness and in the appearance and popularity of Austrian coffeehouses. During Habsburg rule, Lviv became one of the most important Polish, Ukrainian and Jewish cultural centres. In Lviv, according to the Austrian census of 1910, which listed religion and language, 51% of

15582-417: The leadership knew what was happening, but did little to stop it. It was often rear echelon units who committed the rapes. According to professor Oleg Rzheshevsky, "4,148 Red Army officers and many privates were punished for committing atrocities". The exact number of German women and girls raped by Soviet troops during the war and occupation is uncertain, but historians estimate their numbers are likely in

15729-423: The life of any soldier and (almost any) officer of the unit to which he was attached. In 1942, Stalin established the penal battalions composed of gulag inmates, Soviet PoWs, disgraced soldiers, and deserters, for hazardous front-line duty as tramplers clearing Nazi minefields, et cetera. Given the dangers, the maximum sentence was three months. Likewise, the Soviet treatment of Red Army personnel captured by

15876-581: The local archdiocese has developed into the Roman Catholic Metropolis , which since 1375 as diocese had been in Halych . The new metropolis included regional diocese in Lviv, Przemyśl , Chełm , Włodzimierz , Łuck , Kamieniec , as well as Siret and Kijów (see Old Cathedral of St. Sophia, Kyiv ). The first Catholic Archbishop who resided in Lviv was Jan Rzeszowski. In 1434, the Ruthenian domain of

16023-459: The loyalty of such recruits by holding their families as hostages. As a result of this initiative, in 1918 75% of the officers were former tsarists . By mid-August 1920 the Red Army's former tsarist personnel included 48,000 officers, 10,300 administrators, and 214,000 non-commissioned officers . When the civil war ended in 1922, ex-tsarists constituted 83% of the Red Army's divisional and corps commanders. In 1919, 612 "hardcore" deserters of

16170-717: The military forces of the new nation's adversaries during the Russian Civil War , especially the various groups collectively known as the White Army . In February 1946, the Red Army (which embodied the main component of the Soviet Armed Forces alongside the Soviet Navy ) was renamed the " Soviet Army " – which in turn became the Russian Army on 7 May 1992, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Red Army provided

16317-679: The northern portion of Korea . Other Red Army operations included the Soviet invasion of South Sakhalin , which was the Japanese portion of Sakhalin Island (and Russia had lost to Japan in 1905 in the aftermath of the Russo-Japanese War ), and the invasion of the Kuril Islands . Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender of Japan on 15 August. The commanding general of the Kwantung Army ordered

16464-460: The notable Ukrainians buried there are: Lviv#Habsburg Empire Lviv ( / l ə ˈ v iː v / lə- VEEV or / l ə ˈ v iː f / lə- VEEF ; Ukrainian : Львів [ˈlʲwiu̯] ; see below for other names) is the largest city in western Ukraine , as well as the sixth-largest city in Ukraine, with a population of 717,500 (2022 estimate). It serves as

16611-412: The opening of the gate walks a golden lion. Lviv's large coat of arms is a shield, with the coat of arms of the city, crowned with a silver crown with three edges, held by a lion and an ancient warrior. Lviv's flag is a blue square banner with an image of the city emblem and with yellow and blue triangles at the edges. Lviv's logo is an image of five colorful towers in Lviv and the slogan "Lviv — open to

16758-450: The plan), a war memorial built in 1974. This war memorial originally the graves of 3,800 Soviet soldiers who died in the battles against the Nazi occupiers during World War II) (named Great Patriotic War in Soviet ideology ) and against units of Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) ( acting up to the mid-1950s ). On the wall of the memorial was written a verse: At the middle of the planet in

16905-583: The ranks in liberated Soviet territory, and a further 1,836,000 returned from German captivity. The official grand total of losses amounted to 8,668,400. This is the official total dead , but other estimates give the number of total dead up to almost 11 million. Officials at the Russian Central Defense Ministry Archive (CDMA) maintain that their database lists the names of roughly 14 million dead and missing service personnel. In September 1917, Vladimir Lenin wrote: "There

17052-568: The recruitment centres. If they were turned away, they would collect scrap metal and prepare care-packages. In some cases, the money they earned would go towards tanks for the Army. The Council of People's Commissars appointed itself the supreme head of the Red Army, delegating command and administration of the army to the Commissariat for Military Affairs and the Special All-Russian College within this commissariat. Nikolai Krylenko

17199-557: The remains of Soviet soldiers from the location. The exhumation proceedings uncovered remains dating back to the First World War and belonging to soldiers of the German , Austro-Hungarian , Ottoman and Russian armies, which are set to be moved into a dedicated section within the planned memorial, as well as World War II and post-War Soviet burials, which will be transferred to the Holoskiv Cemetery in Lviv. The Cemetery of

17346-668: The same day the office of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces was created, and initially assigned to Jukums Vācietis (and from July 1919 to Sergey Kamenev ). The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces existed until April 1924, the end of Russian Civil War . In November 1923, after the establishment of the Soviet Union, the Russian Narkom of War Affairs was transformed into the Soviet Narkom of War and Marine Affairs. At

17493-520: The same time as the general Soviet move into the areas abandoned by the Ober Ost garrisons that were being withdrawn to Germany in the aftermath of World War I . This merged into the 1919–1921 Polish–Soviet War , in which the Red Army invaded Poland, reaching the central part of the country in 1920, but then suffered a resounding defeat in Warsaw , which put an end to the war. During the Polish Campaign

17640-458: The seat of the Lwów Voivodeship . Following Warsaw, Lviv was the second most important cultural and academic centre of interwar Poland. For example, in 1920 Professor Rudolf Weigl of Lwów University developed a vaccine against typhus fever . Furthermore, the geographic location of Lviv gave it an important role in stimulating international trade and fostering the city's and Poland's economic development. A major trade fair named Targi Wschodnie

17787-644: The settlers were polonised by the end of the 15th century, and the city became a Polish island surrounded by the Ruthenian Orthodox population. In 1356, the Armenian diocese was founded centered at the Armenian Cathedral . Lwów was one of two main cultural and religious centers of Armenians in Poland alongside Kamieniec Podolski . In the early modern period , it also became one of the largest concentrations of Scots and Italians in Poland. In 1412,

17934-518: The so-called " Ausgleich " of February 1867, the Austrian Empire was reformed into a dualist Austria-Hungary and a slow yet steady process of liberalisation of Austrian rule in Galicia started. From 1873, Galicia was de facto an autonomous province of Austria-Hungary , with Polish and Ruthenian as official languages. Germanisation was halted and censorship lifted as well. Galicia was subject to

18081-507: The spread of Latin Church onto the Ruthenian lands. After Casimir had died in 1370, he was succeeded as king of Poland by his nephew, King Louis I of Hungary , who in 1372 put Lviv together with the region of Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia under the administration of his relative Vladislaus II of Opole , Duke of Opole. When in 1387 Władysław retreated from the post of its governor, Galicia-Volhynia became occupied by Hungary , but soon Jadwiga ,

18228-406: The storm clouds thunder deads are watching the sky believing in the wisdom of livings Poetic writing in honor of the Soviet soldiers was eliminated at the direction of urban authorities in 1990s. The Field of Mars has been used as a burial site for Ukrainians soldiers who died during the Russo-Ukrainian War due to the lack of space at the Ukrainian National Army Memorial within the walls of

18375-427: The territories of Eastern Galicia. In August 1920, Lviv was attacked by the Red Army under the command of Aleksandr Yegorov and Stalin during the Polish–Soviet War but the city repelled the attack . For the courage of its inhabitants Lviv was awarded the Virtuti Militari cross by Józef Piłsudski on 22 November 1920. On 23 February 1921, the council of the League of Nations declared that Galicia (including

18522-465: The total 837,000 draft dodgers and deserters were executed following Trotsky's draconian measures. According to Figes, "a majority of deserters (most registered as "weak-willed") were handed back to the military authorities, and formed into units for transfer to one of the rear armies or directly to the front". Even those registered as "malicious" deserters were returned to the ranks when the demand for reinforcements became desperate". Forges also noted that

18669-441: The town around 1270 at its present location, choosing Lviv as his residence, and made it the capital of Galicia-Volhynia. Around 1280 Armenians lived in Galicia and were mainly based in Lviv where they had their own archbishop . In the 13th and early 14th centuries, Lviv was largely a wooden city, except for its several Galician-style stone churches. Some of them, like the Church of Saint Nicholas, have survived, although in

18816-417: The town. They captured the High Castle , murdering its defenders. The city itself was not sacked due to the fact that the leader of the revolution Bohdan Khmelnytsky accepted a ransom of 250,000 ducats, and the Cossacks marched north-west towards Zamość . It was one of two major cities in Poland which was not captured during the so-called Deluge : the other one was Gdańsk . At that time, Lviv witnessed

18963-475: The tradition of blessing arms before battle. To encourage the initiative of Red Army commanders, the CPSU temporarily abolished political commissars , reintroduced formal military ranks and decorations, and introduced the Guards unit concept. Exceptionally heroic or high-performing units earned the Guards title (for example 1st Guards Special Rifle Corps , 6th Guards Tank Army ), an elite designation denoting superior training, materiel, and pay. Punishment also

19110-568: The western military districts. The Axis forces deployed on the Eastern Front consisted of 181 divisions and 18 brigades (3 million soldiers). Three Fronts, the Northwestern , Western , and Southwestern conducted the defense of the western borders of the USSR. In the first weeks of the Great Patriotic War (as it is known in Russia), the Wehrmacht defeated many Red Army units. The Red Army lost millions of men as prisoners and lost much of its pre-war matériel. Stalin increased mobilization, and by 1 August 1941, despite 46 divisions lost in combat,

19257-402: The world" under them. The Latin phrase Semper fidelis ('Always faithful') was used as a motto on the former coat of arms of 1936–1939, but was no longer used after the Second World War . Lviv is on the edge of the Roztochia Upland , about 70 kilometres (43 miles) east of the Polish border and 160 km (99 mi) north of the eastern Carpathian Mountains . The average altitude of Lviv

19404-417: The youngest daughter of Louis, and also the ruler of Poland and wife of King of Poland Władysław II Jagiełło , unified it directly with the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland . The city's prosperity during the following centuries is owed to the trade privileges granted to it by Casimir, Queen Jadwiga , and the subsequent Polish monarchs. Germans, Poles and Czechs formed the largest groups of newcomers. Most of

19551-402: Was Trotsky, and the first commander-in-chief was Jukums Vācietis of the Latvian Riflemen ; in July 1919 he was replaced by Sergey Kamenev . Soon afterwards Trotsky established the GRU (military intelligence) to provide political and military intelligence to Red Army commanders. Trotsky founded the Red Army with an initial Red Guard organization and a core soldiery of Red Guard militiamen and

19698-404: Was a settlement in the form of a borough with a characteristic layout element—an elongated market square. Daniel's foundation of the stronghold was its next reconstruction after the Batu Khan invasion of 1240. Lviv was invaded by the Mongols in 1261. Various sources relate the events, which range from the destruction of the castle to a complete razing of the town. All sources agree that it

19845-434: Was a war between the Soviet Union and Finland . It began with a Soviet offensive on 30 November 1939 – three months after the start of World War II and the Soviet invasion of Poland . The League of Nations deemed the attack illegal and expelled the Soviet Union on 14 December 1939. The Soviet forces led by Semyon Timoshenko had three times as many soldiers as the Finns, thirty times as many aircraft, and

19992-464: Was also a major centre of Jewish culture, in particular as a centre of the Yiddish language , and was the home of the world's first Yiddish-language daily newspaper, the Lemberger Togblat , established in 1904. In the Battle of Galicia at the early stages of the First World War , Lviv was captured by the Russian army in September 1914 following the Battle of Gnila Lipa . The Lemberg Fortress fell on 3 September. The historian Pál Kelemen provided

20139-455: Was established in 1921. In the academic year 1937–1938, there were 9,100 students attending five institutions of higher education, including Lwów University as well as the Polytechnic . Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army , often shortened to the Red Army , was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union . The army was established in January 1918 by Leon Trotsky to oppose

20286-413: Was established with the special effort of Ferentsevich Yuri , a division veteran, Ukrainian emigrant veterans' movement social activist and Plast (National Scout Organization of Ukraine) veteran who took an active part in the creation of memorials to the SS Division Galicia on the mountain Zhbyr and near the village of Chervone . On the north side of the Cemetery is situated Field of Mars (No. 1 on

20433-419: Was killed on 20 November 1917. Nikolai Podvoisky was appointed as the Narkom of War Affairs, leaving Dybenko in charge of the Narkom of Marine Affairs and Ovseyenko – the expeditionary forces to the Southern Russia on 28 November 1917. The Bolsheviks also sent out their own representatives to replace front commanders of the Russian Imperial Army . After the signing of Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918,

20580-501: Was on the orders of the Mongol general Burundai . The Shevchenko Scientific Society says that Burundai issued the order to raze the city. The Galician-Volhynian chronicle states that in 1261 "Said Buronda to Vasylko: 'Since you are at peace with me then raze all your castles'". Basil Dmytryshyn states that the order was implied to be the fortifications as a whole: "If you wish to have peace with me, then destroy [all fortifications of] your towns". After Daniel's death, King Lev rebuilt

20727-569: Was proclaimed with Lviv as its capital. 2,300 Ukrainian soldiers from the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen (Sichovi Striltsi), which had previously been a corps in the Austrian Army, made an attempt to take over Lviv. The city's Polish majority opposed the Ukrainian declaration and began to fight against the Ukrainian troops. During this combat an important role was taken by young Polish city defenders called Lwów Eaglets . The Ukrainian forces withdrew outside Lwów's confines by 21 November 1918, after which elements of Polish soldiers began to loot and burn much of

20874-470: Was reopened in 1817. By 1825, German became the sole language of instruction. Lemberg University was opened by Maria Theresa in 1784. By 1787, her successor Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor opened "Studium Ruthenum" for students who did not know enough Latin to take regular courses. During the 19th century, the Austrian administration attempted to Germanise the city's educational and governmental institutions. Many cultural organisations which did not have

21021-401: Was surrounded by the Ottomans who also failed to conquer it. Three years later, the Battle of Lwów (1675) took place near the city. Lviv was captured for the first time since the Middle Ages by a foreign army in 1704 when Swedish troops under King Charles XII entered the city after a short siege. The plague of the early 18th century caused the death of about 10,000 inhabitants (40% of

21168-399: Was the capital of the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia from 1272 to 1349, when it was conquered by King Casimir III the Great of Poland . From 1434, it was the regional capital of the Ruthenian Voivodeship in the Kingdom of Poland . In 1772, after the First Partition of Poland , the city became the capital of the Habsburg Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria . In 1918, for a short time, it was

21315-521: Was the supreme commander-in-chief, with Aleksandr Myasnikyan as deputy. Nikolai Podvoisky became the commissar for war, Pavel Dybenko , commissar for the fleet. Proshyan, Samoisky, Steinberg were also specified as people's commissars as well as Vladimir Bonch-Bruyevich from the Bureau of Commissars. At a joint meeting of Bolsheviks and Left Socialist-Revolutionaries , held on 22 February 1918, Krylenko remarked: "We have no army. The demoralized soldiers are fleeing, panic-stricken, as soon as they see

21462-512: Was used to transport goods. In the early 20th century, the Poltva was covered over in areas where it flows through the city; the river flows directly beneath Lviv's central street, Liberty Avenue  [ uk ] , and the Lviv Theatre of Opera and Ballet . Lviv's climate is humid continental ( Köppen climate classification Dfb ) with cold winters and warm summers. The average temperatures are −3 °C (27 °F) in January and 18 °C (64 °F) in July. The average annual rainfall

21609-402: Was used; slackers, malingerers, those avoiding combat with self-inflicted wounds cowards, thieves, and deserters were disciplined with beatings, demotions, undesirable/dangerous duties, and summary execution by NKVD punitive detachments. At the same time, the osobist (NKVD military counter-intelligence officers) became a key Red Army figure with the power to condemn to death and to spare

#16983