Ivan Konev
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Soviet occupation of Austria | |
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In office July 1945 – 25 April 1946 | |
President | Karl Renner |
Chancellor | Karl Renner |
Preceded by | Fyodor Tolbukhin (as military commander) |
Succeeded by | Vladimir Kurasov |
Personal details | |
Born | Russian SFSR, Soviet Union | 28 December 1897
Resting place | Kremlin Wall Necropolis |
Awards | Hero of the Soviet Union (twice) |
Military service | |
Allegiance | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Branch/service | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Years of service | 1916–1962 |
Rank | Marshal of the Soviet Union (1944–1962) |
Commands | 2nd Rifle Division 2nd Red Banner Army Transbaikal Military District Steppe Front Kalinin Front Western Front 2nd Ukrainian Front 1st Ukrainian Front Commander of Warsaw Pact Armed Forces |
Battles/wars |
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Ivan Stepanovich Konev (Russian: Ива́н Степа́нович Ко́нев, IPA:
Born to a peasant family, Konev was conscripted into the Imperial Russian Army in 1916 and fought in World War I. In 1919, he joined the Bolsheviks and served in the Red Army during the Russian Civil War. After graduating from Frunze Military Academy in 1926, Konev gradually rose through the ranks of the Soviet military. By 1939, he had become a candidate to the Central Committee of the Communist Party.
Following the
He replaced Zhukov as commander of Soviet ground forces in 1946. In 1956, he was appointed commander of the Warsaw Pact armed forces, and led the violent suppression of the Hungarian Revolution and Prague Spring. In 1961, as commander of Soviet forces in East Germany, he ordered the closing of West Berlin to East Berlin during the building of the Berlin Wall. Konev remained a popular military figure in the Soviet Union until his death in 1973.
Early life
Konev was born 28 December 1897 in the village of Lodeyno in the Nikolsky Uyezd of Vologda Governorate to a peasant family of Russian ethnicity. Konev graduated from a parish school in the village of Yakovlevskaya Gora in 1906, and later the Nikolo-Pushemsky Zemstvo School in the neighboring village of Schetkino in 1912. At the age of 15, he found work as a forester and lumberjack at Podosinovets and Arkhangelsk.[2]
Military career
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ae/Ivan_Stepanovich_Konev_2.jpg)
In the beginning of 1915, he was conscripted into the Imperial Russian Army. Konev was sent to the 2nd Heavy Artillery Brigade at Moscow and then graduated from artillery training courses. Posted to the 2nd Separate Heavy Artillery Battalion (then part of the
When the
In 1926 Konev completed advanced officer training courses at the
World War II
When Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, Konev was assigned command of the 19th Army in the Vitebsk region, and waged a series of defensive battles during the Red Army's retreat, first to Smolensk and then to the approaches to Moscow.
He commanded the
Konev held
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b4/%D0%96%D1%83%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B2_%D0%B8_%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%B2.jpg/220px-%D0%96%D1%83%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B2_%D0%B8_%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%B2.jpg)
He participated in the Battle of Kursk, commanding the southern part of the Soviet counter-offensive, the Steppe Front, where he actively and energetically promoted maskirovka (the use of military camouflage and deception).[6] Among the maskirovka measures he adopted to achieve tactical surprise were the camouflaging of defense lines and depots; dummy units and supply points; a dummy air-defense network; and the use of reconnaissance units to verify the quality of his army's camouflage and deception works. In David Glantz's view, Konev's forces "generated a major portion of the element of surprise".[6]
As a result, the Germans seriously underestimated the strength of the Soviet defenses. The commander of the 19th Panzer division of the Wehrmacht, General G. Schmidt, wrote that "We did not assume that there was even one fourth [of the Russian strength] of what we had to encounter".[6]
After the Soviet victory (August 1943) at Kursk, Konev's armies retook
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/be/Prague_liberation_1945_konev.jpg/220px-Prague_liberation_1945_konev.jpg)
For Konev's achievements in Ukraine, the Presidium promoted him to Marshal of the Soviet Union in February 1944.[8] Konev was one of Stalin's favorite generals and one of the few senior commanders whom even Stalin admired for his ruthlessness.[9]
During 1944 Konev's armies advanced from
By July, he had advanced to the Vistula River in central Poland, and was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. In September 1944 his forces, now designated the Fourth Ukrainian Front, advanced into Slovakia and fought alongside the Slovak partisans in their rebellion against German occupation.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/73/%D0%9F%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B4_%D0%9F%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%B5%D0%B4%D1%8B_%D0%BD%D0%B0_%D0%9A%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%BF%D0%BB%D0%BE%D1%89%D0%B0%D0%B4%D0%B8_24_%D0%B8%D1%8E%D0%BD%D1%8F_1945_%D0%B3._%2824%29.jpg/220px-%D0%9F%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B4_%D0%9F%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%B5%D0%B4%D1%8B_%D0%BD%D0%B0_%D0%9A%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%BF%D0%BB%D0%BE%D1%89%D0%B0%D0%B4%D0%B8_24_%D0%B8%D1%8E%D0%BD%D1%8F_1945_%D0%B3._%2824%29.jpg)
In January 1945, Konev, together with
In April Konev's troops, together with the
Post-war career
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ae/%D0%9C%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%88%D0%B0%D0%BB_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D1%8E%D0%B7%D0%B0_%D0%B4%D0%B2%D0%B0%D0%B6%D0%B4%D1%8B_%D0%93%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D1%8E%D0%B7%D0%B0_%D0%98%D0%B2%D0%B0%D0%BD_%D0%A1%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%BF%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%87_%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%B2.jpg/170px-%D0%9C%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%88%D0%B0%D0%BB_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D1%8E%D0%B7%D0%B0_%D0%B4%D0%B2%D0%B0%D0%B6%D0%B4%D1%8B_%D0%93%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_%D0%A1%D0%BE%D1%8E%D0%B7%D0%B0_%D0%98%D0%B2%D0%B0%D0%BD_%D0%A1%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%BF%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%87_%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%B2.jpg)
After the war the Soviet Union appointed Konev as head of the Soviet occupation forces in
Following the
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e0/Szent_Istv%C3%A1n_k%C3%B6r%C3%BAt_a_Falk_Miksa_%28N%C3%A9phadsereg%29_utca_fel%C5%91l_a_Honv%C3%A9d_utca_fel%C3%A9_n%C3%A9zve._A_szovjet_csapatok_ideiglenes_kivonul%C3%A1sa_1956._okt%C3%B3ber_31-%C3%A9n._Fortepan_24787.jpg/220px-thumbnail.jpg)
The British military historian John Erickson wrote that he was surprised with the extent of personal archives (lichnye arkhivy) held by former Red Army soldiers of many ranks, and that "there is no substitute for having the late Marshal Koniev (sic) – spectacles perched on nose – read from his own personal notebook, detailing operational orders, his own personal instructions to select commanders and his tally of Soviet casualties. And while on the subject of casualties, Marshal Koniev made it plain that, though such figures did exist, he was not prepared on his own authority to allow certain figures to be released for publication while a number of commanders were still alive."[14]
Konev remained one of the Soviet Union's most admired military figures until his death in 1973. He married twice, and his daughter Nataliya is Dean of the Department of Linguistics and Literature at the Military University of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.
In 1969, the Ministry of Defence of the USSR published Konev's 285-page war memoir called Forty-Five. It was later translated into English in the same year and published by Progress Publishers, Moscow. This work discusses Konev's taking of Berlin, Prague, his work with Zhukov, Stalin, his field meeting with General Omar Bradley and Jascha Heifetz. In English, the book was titled I. Konev – Year of Victory. It was also published in Spanish and French under the titles El Año 45 and L'an 45 respectively.
Konev died on 21 May 1973 at age 75 in Moscow. Following his cremation, his ashes were placed in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis with those of the greatest figures of the USSR, and can still be visited today.
Monuments
Konev has monuments, primarily in Russia. The places include Svidník, Patriot Park (Moscow region), Kirov, Belgorod, Nizhny Novgorod, Omsk, and Vologda.
On 9 January 1991, his memorial sculpture in Kraków was dismantled less than just 4 years after it had been unveiled. The sculpture was given to the Russian city of Kirov.[15][circular reference][16] The memorial plaque in front of the apartment building where he lived (three blocks from the Kremlin) is still mounted on the brick wall.
The Konev monument erected by the communist government of Czechoslovakia in Prague 6 (náměstí Interbrigády) in 1980 became a subject of controversy that escalated in 2018, after which the city administration added explanatory text to the monument, noting the participation of its subject in the suppression of the Hungarian Revolution and the Prague Spring.[17] The monument was removed on 3 April 2020, with the Czech president Miloš Zeman criticizing the removal as "an abuse of the state of emergency".[18][19][20] Within days, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation announced it would begin a symbolic investigation of the alleged "defiling of symbols of Russia's military glory".[21]
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Konev's grave in the Kremlin Wall
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Former monument in Kharkiv
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Monument in Kirov
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Monument in Vologda
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Bust in Slovakia
Honours and awards
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/ee/Ivan_Konev_2022_stamp_of_Russia.jpg/220px-Ivan_Konev_2022_stamp_of_Russia.jpg)
- Soviet Union
"Gold Star" Hero of the Soviet Union, twice (29 July 1944, 1 June 1945) |
Order of Victory (№ 5–3 March 1945) |
Seven Orders of Lenin (29 July 1944, 21 February 1945, 27 December 1947, 18 December 1956, 27 December 1957, 27 December 1967, 28 December 1972)
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Order of the October Revolution (22 February 1968) |
Order of the Red Banner, three times (22 February 1938, 3 November 1944, 20 June 1949) |
Order of Suvorov, 1st class, twice (27 August 1943, 17 May 1944) |
Order of Kutuzov, 1st class, twice (9 April 1943, 28 July 1943) |
Order of the Red Star, (16 August 1936) |
Medal "For the Defence of Moscow" (1 May 1944) |
Medal "For the Liberation of Prague" (9 June 1945) |
Medal "For the Capture of Berlin" (9 June 1945) |
Medal "For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945" (1945) |
Jubilee Medal "Twenty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945" (1965)
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Jubilee Medal "XX Years of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army" (22 February 1938) |
Jubilee Medal "30 Years of the Soviet Army and Navy" (22 February 1948) |
Jubilee Medal "40 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR" (17 February 1958) |
Jubilee Medal "50 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR" (1968) |
Jubilee Medal "In Commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of the Birth of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin" (1969) |
Honorary weapon – sword inscribed with golden national emblem of the Soviet Union (22 February 1968) |
- Honorary citizen of Bălți (Moldova) and other cities
- Foreign
Hero of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (28 April 1970) |
Hero of the Mongolian People's Republic (Mongolian People's Republic, 7 May 1971) |
Patriotic Order of Merit, in silver (East Germany) |
Order of Sukhbaatar, twice (Mongolian People's Republic, 1961 and 1971) |
Order of the Red Banner (Mongolian People's Republic) |
Virtuti Militari, 1st class (Poland) |
Cross of Grunwald , 1st class (Poland)
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Order of Polonia Restituta, 1st class (Poland) |
Golden Order of the Partisan Star (Yugoslavia) |
Order of the People's Republic of Bulgaria, 1st class (Bulgaria) |
Order of Klement Gottwald (Czechoslovakia) |
Order of the White Lion, 1st class (Czechoslovakia) |
Military Order of the White Lion, 1st class (Czechoslovakia) |
War Cross 1939–1945 (Czechoslovakia) |
Order of Merit of the Hungarian People Republic (Hungary) |
Order of the Hungarian Freedom (Hungary) |
Honorary Knight Commander, Order of the Bath (UK) |
Military Cross (UK) |
Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour (France) |
Croix de guerre 1939–1945 (France)
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Chief Commander of the Legion of Merit (USA) |
Medal of Sino-Soviet Friendship (China) |
References
- ^ "Ivan Stepanovich Konev – Soviet general". britannica.com. Retrieved 8 April 2018.
- ^ a b c d "Конев Иван Степанович" [Konev Ivan Stepanovich]. warheroes.ru (in Russian). Retrieved 19 February 2016.
- ^ a b Krupka, Jaroslav (12 September 2019). "Maršál Koněv: špatný velitel, zároveň ale muž, který si šel tvrdě za svým". Deník.cz (in Czech). Retrieved 24 April 2020.
- ISBN 978-1781592915.
- ISBN 978-1911096146
- ^ ISBN 0415408598
- ISBN 0-15-622591-3.
- ^ Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР «О присвоении генералу армии Коневу И. С. военного звания маршала Советского Союза» от 20 февраля 1944 года // Ведомости Верховного Совета Союза Советских Социалистических Республик : газета. — 1944. — 29 февраля (№ 12 (272)). — С. 1
- ^ Chen, Peter. "Ivan Konev". World War II Database. Retrieved 19 February 2018.
- ^
ISBN 9780700614653. Retrieved 19 September 2022.
- Krasnaia Zvezda, 12 April 2001
- ^ "Ein umstrittener Held der Sowjetunion". Prager Zeitung (in German). 1 June 2016. Retrieved 24 April 2020.
- ^ Kaimakov, Anton (19 June 2018). "Маршал Конев и вторжение 1968" [Marshal Konev and the invasion of 1968]. Czech Radio (in Russian). Retrieved 11 April 2020.
- ISBN 0-304-36541-6.
- ^ ru:Памятник маршалу Коневу (Киров
- ^ "9 stycznia 1991 r. Pomnik marszałka Iwana Koniewa wywieziony z Krakowa" (in Polish). Interia. 9 January 2014.
- ^ "U sochy maršála Koněva odhalili vysvětlující desky. Přepisujete historii, protestovali komunisté" [Explanatory plaque unveiled at Marshal Konev sculpture, Communists protest rewriting of history]. ČTK (in Czech). 21 August 2018. Retrieved 21 August 2018.
- ^ "Praha 6 odstranila sochu maršála Koněva" [Prague 6 removed the statue of Marshal Konev]. ČTK (in Czech). 3 April 2020. Retrieved 3 April 2020.
- ^ "Controversial Soviet-Era Statue Removed in Prague". The Moscow Times. Agence France-Presse. 3 April 2020. Retrieved 18 April 2020.
- ^ "'Red is beautiful' says mayor of Prague 6 after refusing to remove paint from vandalised statue". 23 August 2019.
- ^ "Moscow Opens Criminal Case Over Removal Of Soviet Marshal's Statue In Prague". RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty. 10 April 2020. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fa/Wikiquote-logo.svg/34px-Wikiquote-logo.svg.png)
- Year of Victory, Konev's memoir translated into English by Progress Publishers and reprinted in 1984.
- Ivan Konev Newsreels at Net-Film Newsreels and Documentary Films Archive