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Alexander Mikhailovitch Vasilevsky
File:Vasilevsky.png Marshal of the Soviet Union Alexander Vasilevsky
Allegiance	Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Years of service	1915-1959
Rank	Marshal of the Soviet Union
Unit	Chief of General Staff Minister of Defense
Battles / wars	World War I Winter War Great Patriotic War Operation August Storm
Awards	Order of Victory (x2) Hero of the Soviet Union (x2) Order of Lenin (x8) Order of the Red Banner(x2)
Other work	Memoirs The matter of my whole life, first published in 1973.

Alexander Mikhailovitch Vasilevsky (also spelled Vasilievsky, Vasilyevsky, Vasilievskii etc, Russian: Александр Михайлович Василевский) (September 30 1895 - December 5 1977) is a famous Soviet military commander, promoted Marshal of the Soviet Union in 1943, former Chief of Staff of Soviet forces and minister of Defense in 1949-1953.

Biography

Childhood and early years

Vasilevsky was born 30 September (18 September O.S.) 1895 in Novaya Golchikha in the Kishenemski uezd near Kostroma (now part of the city of Vichuga in Kostroma Oblast. His father, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Vasilevsky was a poor priest in Nikolsk temple nearby. His mother, Nadezhda Ivanovna Sokolova, was a daughter of a priest of the village of Ugletz, Kishenemski uezd. He was the fourth of eight children in the family. Reportedly, Vasilevsky along with three of his brothers, broke all contact with his parents since 1926, because of his VKP(b) membership and his military duties in the Red Army. Their relation resumed in 1940 following Stalin's proposal.

According to Vasilevsky himself, his family was extremely poor. His father spent a major part of his time working to earn money, with children working in the field. In 1897, the family moved to Novopokrovskoe, where his father became a priest in the newly built Voznesensky temple. Alexander started his education in the church school there. In 1909, he entered Kostroma seminary, at a cost of considerable financial sacrifices from his parents. The same year, a ministry directive preventing former seminarists from starting university studies spread a nation-wide movement, with classes stopping in most Russian seminaries. Vasilevsky among the others was expelled from Kostroma and returned there only several months later, after seminarists' revendications were fulfilled to an acceptable extent.

World War I and Civil war

Vasilevsky wanted, "after finishing his studies in the seminary and working for a few years as a teacher to get some money", to become an agronomist or a surveyor, but World War I changed his plans, as he decided to become a soldier instead. He asked to pass his exams in advance in January 1915 and entered the Alexander Military Law Academy in February. As he recalls, "I did not decide to become an officer to start a military career. I still wanted to be an agronom and work in some remote corner of Russia after the war. I could not suppose that everything would change: the country would change, and I would.". After four months of courses that he later considered to be completely outdated, theoretic and inappropriate for modern warfare, he was sent to front as a praporshchik in May 1915.

From June to September, Vasilevsky was affected to several reserve regiments and finally arrived on the front in September as a half-company commander in the 409th Novokhopersky regiment, 109th division, 9th Army. By spring 1916, Vasilevsky became a company commander, and his company eventually become one of the best in the regiment according to his own commander. In May 1916, he led his men during the famous Brusilov offensive, during which he became a battalion commander because of heavy casualties among officers and earned the rank of captain by age 22.

In November 1917, following the Russian Revolution, Vasilevsky decided to end his military career. As he recalls, "There was a time when I led soldiers to battle, thinking I was doing my duty of a Russian patriot. Now I understood the were have been cheated, that people need peace. [...] Therefore, my military career had to end. With no remorse, I could go back to my favourite occupation, working in the field." He sets on a journey from Romania, where his former army was then deployed, back to his own village.

During December 1917, back home, Vasilevsky learned that men of the 409th regiment, now based in Ukraine, elected him as their commander (at the beginning of the Russian Revolution, commanders were elected by their men). However, local military authorities recommended Vasilevsky to decline the proposal, because of heavy fighting going between pro-Soviet partisans and the Central Rada wishing for indepedence. He followed the advice and became a drill instructor in his own Kishinemsk uezd. However, he stopped in September 1918 and became a school teacher in Tula Oblast.

In April 1919, Vasilevsky was again conscripted in the Red Army and sent to command a Red Army company fighting against "armed bands" and helping with prodrazvyorstka. Later that year, Vasilevsky becomes commander of a new reserve batallion, then, in October 1919 a regimental commander. However, his regiment never took part in the civil war as Denikin's troops never got close to Tula. In December 1919, Vasilevsky's was sent to Western front as a regimental deputy commander, where he took part in Polish-Soviet War.

Interwar

After the official end of Russian Civil War, Vasilevsky fought with various anti-Soviet paramilitary groups in Belarus and in Smolensk Oblast until August 1921. Until 1930, he gradually raised in rank until regimental commander of 142th, 143th and finally 144th rifle regiments, where he showed great skills regarding organization and training of his troopers. In 1928, he graduated from regimental commanders' courses "Vystrel". During all these years, Vasilevsky started to tie friendships with higher command and Party members: Kliment Voroshilov, Vladimir Triandafillov and Boris Shaposhnikov, who would become Vasilevsky's protector until his death in 1945. Vasilevsky's skills did not go unnoticed, and in 1931, he was appointed member of the Direction of Military Training.

While there, he supervised Red Army's training and worked on military manuals and field books. He also met several high military commanders, such as Mikhail Tukhachevsky. He also met Zhukov, who was at that time deputy cavalry inspector of the Red Army. Zhukov defined Vasilevsky as "a man who knew his job as he spent a long time commanding a regiment and who earned a great respect from everybody." In 1934, Vasilevsky was appointed senior military training supervisor of the Volga Military District (Приволжский военный округ). In 1937, Vasilevsky entered the Academy of the General Staff. While there, he studied important aspects of military strategy, dispensed by proeminent Soviet generals, such as Mikhail Tukhachevsky.

File:Vasilevsky deputy operations general staff.jpg

Vasilevsky as Deputy Commander of Operations Direction of the General Staff in 1940.

By mid-1937, Stalin's Great Purges eliminated a significant portion of high military commanders, freeing a number of positions at the General Staff. To his amazement, Vasilevsky was appointed to the General Staff in October 1937, as the responsible for operationnal training of senior officers. In 1938, he was made a member of the CPSU (a sine qua non condition for a successful career in the Soviet Union) and in 1939, he was appointed Deputy Commander of Operations Direction of the General Staff in the grade of division commander. While there, he was responsible, along with Shaposhnikov, of planning the Winter War, and later, for setting the demarcation line with Finland after the peace treaty.

As a senior officer, Vasilevsky started to have frequent meetings with Stalin. At one of the meetings, Stalin asked Vasilevsky about his family. Since Vasilevsky's father was a priest and was a potential "enemy of the people", Vasilevsky said that he ended any relationship with them in 1926. Stalin, surprised, asked him to reestablish at once his family ties and help them.

World War II

Start and Battle of Moscow

On June 22, 1941, Vasilevsky, who was spending his days and nights in the General Staff that time, learned of the German bombing of several important military and civilian objectives, starting the Great Patriotic War. In August 1941, Vasilevsky was apppointed Commander of Operations Direction of the General Staff and Deputy of the Chief of the General Staff, making him one of the most proeminent military commanders. At the end of September 1941, Vasilevsky gave a speech in front of General Staff officers, during which he described the situation as extremely difficult, but pointing out that the northern part of the front was not moving, that Leningrad was still fighting, and that such a situation would potentially allow some reserves to be gathered in the North.

In October 1941, as the situation at the front was becoming critical and German forces advanced to Moscow during the operation Typhoon, Vasilevsky was sent to the West Front as a representative of the STAVKA to coordinate the defenses and guarantee a flow of supplies and men towards the Mozhaisk region, where Soviet forces were attempting to contain the German armies. During the heavy fights almost in the outskirts of Moscow, Vasilevsky was spending all his available time both in the STAVKA and on the front line, trying to coordinate Soviet defenses. When a part of the General Staff (including its Chief Marshal Shaposhnikov) was evacuated out of Moscow, Vasilevsky remained in the city to coordinate the work between the Moscow Staff and the evacuated part of the General Staff. In his memoirs, Nikita Khrushchev describes Vasilevsky as an "able specialist" even so early in the war. On October 28, 1941 he was promoted Lieutenant General.

The Battle of Moscow was a very difficult period in the life of Vasilevsky, with the enemy fighting in the outskirts of Moscow and Wehrmacht officers seeing some of Moscow's buildings in their field glasses. As the Deputy Chief of General Staff, Vasilevsky was responsible for that whole front. As he recalls, his workday often ended at 4am. Moreover, with Marshal Shaposhnikov ill, Vasilevsky had to take important decisions himself. On 29 October, 1941 a bomb exploded in the courtyard of the General Staff. Vasilevsky was slightly wounded by kept on working. The General Staff was relocated underground, with no hot food as the kitchen was damaged by the explosion. Nevertheless, everyone kept on working. In December, Vasilevsky coordinated the Moscow counter-offensive, and by early 1942, the general counteroffensive on Moscow and Rostov directions, further motivated by the return of his evacuated family in Moscow. In April 1942, Vasilevsky was responsible for coordinating the (unsuccessful) elimination of the Demyansk pocket. On April 24, with Shaposhnikov seriously ill again, he was appointed as temporary Chief of Staff, and on April 26, he was promoted to Colonel General.

Summer and fall 1942

In May 1942 happened one of the most contoversial episodes in the career of Vasilevsky: the Second Battle of Kharkov, a failed offensive that led to a stinging defeat of the Red Army and ultimately to a series of German offensives in the South. The morale of the troops was high and Stalin was determined to launch another general offensive. However, Vasilevsky recognizes that "the reality was "more harsh than that". Therefore, the Kharkov offensive was launched on May 12, 1942. When the threat of encirclement became obvious, Vasilevsky and Zhukov asked for withdrawal, but Stalin refused, leading to the encirclement of the Soviet armies and a stinging defeat. Khrushchev, in his memoirs, later accused Vasilevsky of being too passive and unable to take a decision, as well as being unabled to defend his point of view in front of Stalin during that particular operation. In June 1942, Vasilevsky was briefly sent to Leningrad to coordinate an attempt to break the encirclement of the 2nd Shock Army led by general Vlasov.

On June 26, 1942, topping his military career, Vasilevsky was appoined Chief of the General Staff, and in October 1942, Deputy Minister of Defense. He was now on of the few people responsible for operation planning of the whole Soviet-German front. Starting from July 23, 1942 he was a STAVKA representative on Stalingrad direction, which he anticipated to be the most important compared to Caucasus direction.

The Battle of Stalingrad was another difficult period in Vasilevsky's life. Sent along with Zhukov at the front, trying to coordinate the defenses of Stalingrad with radio links working haphazardly at best. On September 12, 1942 during a meeting with Stalin, Vasilevsky and Zhukov, after a night of reflexion, exposed their plan of Stalingrad counteroffensive. Two months later, on November 19, 1942, with Stalingrad still standing, the operation Uranus was launched. Since Zhukov was sent north near Rzhev to coordinate the Operation Mars, Vasilevsky remained at Stalingrad to coordinate the double-pincer attack that ultimately led to German defeat at Stalingrad, and the annihilation of the encircled German armies according to a plan he presented to Stalin on December 9, 1942. This plan sparkled some controversies between Vasilevsky and Rokossovsky, who wanted an additionnal army for clearing Stalingrad, something he reminded to Vasilevsky even years after the war.

Soviet victory

Vasilevsky and Budyonny in the Donbass, 1943.

Starting from January 1943, Vasilevsky coordinated the offensives near Voronezh and Ostrogozhsk on the upper Don, leading to decisive encirclements of several divisions. Mid-January, Vasilevsky was promoted General of the Army and on February 16, only 29 days after, he was made Marshal of the Soviet Union.

During Spring 1943, after the creation of the Kursk salient and the failure of the third battle of Kharkov, Stalin and the STAVKA had to decide whether the offensive had to be pursued despite this drawback or to assume a defensive stance. Vasilevsky and Zhukov managed to persuade Stalin to stop the offensive for the moment and wait for the initiative from the Wehrmacht. Later, when it became clear that German offensive was postponed and would no longer take place in May 1943, Vasilevsky defended the idea of waiting for it rather than making a preemptive strike, as Khrushchev wanted to. When the Battle of Kursk finally started on July 4, 1943, Vasilevsky was responsible for the coordination of Voronezh and Steppe Fronts during the battle. After the German failure at Kursk and the start of the general counteroffensive on the left shore of the Dnieper, Vasilevsky planned and executed the operations in the Donbass region.. Later that year, he developed and executed the clearing of Crimea from Nazi forces.

At the beginning of 1944, Vasilevsky coordinated the operations on the right shore of Dnieper, leading to Soviet victory in the eastern part of Ukraine. On April 10, 1944, the day Odessa was retaken, Vasilevsky was presented the Order of Victory, the second one ever awarded (the first one being awarded to Zhukov). After the end of fights around Sevastopol on May 10, 1944, Vasilevsky wanted to examine the city. While driving around it, his car rolled on a mine. Vasilevsky was wounded in the head and cut by flying glass. He was then briefly evacuated to Moscow for recovery.

File:Vasilevsky Belorussian operation.jpg

Vasilevsky during Operation Bagration in 1944.

During the operation Bagration, Vasilevsky coordinated the offensives of 1st Baltic, 2nd Baltic and 3rd Belorussian Fronts. When Soviet forces entered the Baltic republics, Vasilevsky assumed the complete responsability of all three Baltic fronts, discarding the 3rd Belorussian. On July 29, 1944, he was made Hero of the Soviet Union for his military successes. In February 1945, Vasilevsky was appointed commander of 3rd Bielorussian Front to lead the East Prussian Operation, leaving the post of General Chief of Staff to Antonov. As front commander, Vasilevsky led the Prussian operation and organized the assaults on Königsberg and Pillau. He also negotiated the surrender of the Königsberg garrison with its commanders. After the war, the commander of Königsberg's garrison, Otto Lasch, accused Vasilevsky of non-respect of guarantees provided during the city's capitulation. For his brilliant successes at Königsberg and in Eastern Prussia, Vasilevsky was awarded his second Order of Victory.

Operation August Storm

During the 1944 summer, Stalin announced to Vasilevsky that he would appointed commander-in-chief of Soviet forces in the Far East after the war with Germany would be over. Vasilevsky started to make first drafts of the plan at the fall of 1944, then started a full-time preparation starting from April 27, 1944. In June 1945, his plan was approved by Stalin and Vasilevsky was appointed commander-in-chief of Soviet forces in the Far East and flew to Chita.

During the preparation, Vasilevsky further prepared the offensive and directed its start. In 24 days, from August 9, 1945 to September 2, 1945 the Japan armies in Manchukuo were defeated. For his success in this operation, Vasilevsky was awarded his second Hero of the Soviet Union title on September 8, 1945.

Post-WWII

File:Soviet army 50th annivrsary.jpg

Vasilevsky in the Kremlin during a ceremony on the 50th anniversary of Soviet Army.

Between 1946 and 1949, Vasilevsky was still the Chief of Staff, then Defense minister from 1949 to 1953. In 1953, following Stalin's death, Vasilevsky fell in disgrace and was replaced by Bulganin, although he remained deputy Defense minister. In 1956, he was appointed "deputy Defense minister on military science", a secondary position with no real military power. He would occupy it for only one year before being pensionned off by Khruschev, victim of the bloodless purge that saw the end of Zhukov as well. In 1959, he was appointed General Inspector of Ministry of Defense, a honorary puppet position. In 1973, he published his memoirs, "The matter of my whole life". Alexander Vasilevsky died on 5 December 1977. His body was cremated and ashes immured inside the Kremlin wall.

Awards

In his memoirs, Vasilevsky recalls Stalin's astonishment when, at a ceremony taking place in the Kremlin on December 4, 1941, the Soviet leader saw just a single Order of the Red Star and a medal on Vasilevsky's uniform. However, Vasilevsky eventually became one of the most decorated commanders. His awards include:

• Two Gold Starof Hero of the Soviet Union
• Two Orders of Victory (becoming one of the three people to achieve such a feat , the other two being Zhukov and Stalin).
• Eight orders of Lenin
• Order of the October Revolution
• Two orders of the Red Banner
• Order of Suvorov, 1st class
• Order of the Red Star

   * «За воинскую доблесть. В ознаменование 100-летия со дня рождения Владимира Ильича Ленина»,
   * «XX лет РККА» (1938),
   * «За оборону Ленинграда»,
   * «За оборону Москвы»,
   * «За оборону Сталинграда»,
   * «За взятие Кёнингсберга»,
   * «За победу над Германией в Великой Отечественной войне 1941—1945 гг.»,
   * «За победу над Японией»,
   * «Двадцать лет победы в Великой Отечественной войне 1941—1945 гг.»,
   * «Тридцать лет победы в Великой Отечественной войне 1941—1945 гг.»,
   * «В память 800-летия Москвы»,
   * «30 лет Советской Армии и Флота»,
   * «40 лет Вооружённых Сил СССР»,
   * «50 лет Вооружённых Сил СССР».

, as well as 14 foreign decorations such as Polish Virtuti Militari and numerous medals.

Personality and contemporary opinion

File:Stalin Vasilevsky Rokkosovskiy Mausoleum.jpg

Stalin, Vasilevsky and Rokossovsky on Lenin Mausoleum's tribune during a military parade.

Vasilevsky was regarded by his peers and a kind and soft (for a military commander) boss. For instance, General Shtemenko, who a was a member of the General Staff during the war, described Vasilevsky as a brilliant yet modest officer with an outstanding experience of staff work. Shtemenko points out Vasilevsky's talent for strategy and operations planning. He also denotes his respect of the subordinates, and an acute sense of diplomacy and politeness, which was appreciated by Stalin. Therefore, Vasilevsky enjoyed almost unlimited Stalin's trust. Several years before the war, Zhukov defined Vasilevsky as "a man who knew his job as he spent a long time commanding a regiment and who earned a great respect from everybody." An other example of Vasilevsky's modesty is the fact his awards (including the two orders of Victory) are never mentioned in his memoirs.

This being said, while sparkling less controversies than Zhukov, Vasilevsky's actions and personality are sometimes disputed. In particular, Nikita Khrushchev defines Vasilevsky in his memoirs as a passive commander completely under control of Stalin, and endorsed him with the responsability of the Kharkov failure in Spring 1942. One has to note that Khrushchev's memoirs were made unofficially after he got ousted from power by Brezhnev and therefore went only through limited censorship. Among Vasilevsky's strong critics was Rokossovsky, who criticized Vasilevsky decisions during the Stalingrad counteroffensive, most notably for his refusal to commit the 2nd Army to the annihilation of Stalingrad pocket, directing it instead to counterattack German forces attempting to relieve Stalingrad, and for general interference with his work. Surprised, he even writes in his memoires: "I do not even understand what role could Zhukov and Vasilevsky play on Stalingrad front".

On the other hand, the controversial historian Victor Suvorov praises Vasilevsky more than Zhukov. According to him, Vasilevsky was the only responsible of the successful Soviet counteroffensive at Stalingrad and Zhukov played no role whatsoever in it. He claims that Vasilevsky was the best military commander and that Soviet victory was mainly his responsability as the Chief of Staff. According to Suvorov, Zhukov and Soviet propaganda tried, after the war, to reduce the role of the General Staff (and thus the importance of Vasilevsky) and to increase, on the other hand, the role of the Party and Zhukov.

A more balanced post-1991 view on Vasilevsky was elaborated by Mezhiritzky in his book "Reading Marshal Zhukov". In this book, Mezhiritzky points out Vasilevsky's timidity and incapacity to defend his opinions in front of Stalin. Reportedly, Vasilevsky was appointed to such high military positions because he was easy to manage. However, he recognizes Vasilevsky's intelligence and assumes that Vasilevsky was indeed the main author of the Stalingrad counteroffensive. He also points out that Vasilevsky and Zhukov probably deliberately reduced the estimated strength of the 6th Army in order to have Stalin's approval for that risky operation.

Footnotes

Bibliography

• Marshal A.M. Vasilevsky, The matter of my whole life, Moscow, Politizdat, 1978
• Marshal G.K. Zhukov, Memoirs, Moscow, Olma-Press, 2002
• S.M. Shtemenko, General staff during the war, 2nd ed., Moscow, Voenizdat, 1989
• Marshal K. Rokossovsky, Soldier's duty, Moscow, Politizdat, 1988.
• P.Ya.Mezhiritzky, Reading Marshal Zhukov, Philadelphia, Libas Consulting, 2002
• Marshal I.Ch. Bagramyan, How we marched towards victory, Moscow, Voenizdat, 1977
• Viktor Suvorov, Shadow of Victory, Moscow, ACT, 2002
• Nikita Khrushchev, Time. People. Power. (Memoirs), tome 1, Moscow, IIK "Moscow News", 1999
• Beevor, Antony. Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege. Viking; New York City: 1998. ISBN 0-670-87095-1