Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovsky | |
---|---|
Deputy Prime Minister of Poland | |
In office 20 November 1952 – 18 March 1954 | |
Prime Minister | Bolesław Bierut Józef Cyrankiewicz |
Preceded by | Zenon Nowak |
Succeeded by | Jakub Berman |
Minister of National Defence of Poland | |
In office 6 November 1949 – 13 November 1956 | |
Prime Minister | Józef Cyrankiewicz Bolesław Bierut Józef Cyrankiewicz |
Preceded by | Michał Rola-Żymierski |
Succeeded by | Marian Spychalski |
Personal details | |
Born | Konstantin Ksaveryevich Rokossovsky (Konstanty Ksaweriewicz Rokossowski) 21 December 1896 |
Battles/wars | |
Konstantin Konstantinovich[a] Rokossovsky (Russian: Константин Константинович (Ксаверьевич) Рокоссовский; Polish: Konstanty Rokossowski; 21 December 1896 – 3 August 1968) was a Soviet and Polish officer who became a Marshal of the Soviet Union, a Marshal of Poland, and served as Poland's Defence Minister from 1949 until his removal in 1956 during the Polish October.[2] He became one of the most prominent Red Army commanders of World War II.
Born in Warsaw (in present-day Poland; then part of the Russian Empire), or, according to other sources, in Velikiye Luki, Rokossovsky served in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I. In 1917 he joined the Red Guards and in 1918 the newly-formed Red Army; he fought with great distinction during the Russian Civil War of 1917–1922. Rokossovsky held senior commands until 1937 when he fell victim to the Great Purge, during which he was branded a traitor, imprisoned and tortured.
After Soviet failures in the Winter War of 1939–1940, Rokossovsky was taken out of prison and reinstated due to an urgent need for experienced officers. Following Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, Rokossovsky played key roles in the defense of Moscow (1941–1942) and the counter-offensives at Stalingrad (1942–1943) and Kursk (1943). He was instrumental in planning and executing part of Operation Bagration (1944)—one of the most decisive Red Army successes of the war—for which he was made a Marshal of the Soviet Union.
After the war, Rokossovsky became Defence Minister and deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers in the newly-established Polish People's Republic. Forced out of office in Poland in 1956 after Władysław Gomułka became the leader of Poland, Rokossovsky then returned to the Soviet Union, where he lived out the rest of his life until his death in 1968.
Early life
Konstanty Ksaweriewicz Rokossowski (Konstantin Ksaveryevich Rokossovsky) was born in
Orphaned at 14, Rokossovsky started working in a stocking factory.[3] In 1911, at age 15, he became an apprentice stonemason.[8] Much later in his life, the government of the Polish People's Republic used this fact for propaganda, claiming that Rokossovsky had helped to build Warsaw's Poniatowski Bridge.
When Rokossovsky enlisted in the
Early military career
On joining the Kargopolsky 5th Dragoon Regiment, Rokossovsky soon showed himself a talented soldier and leader. He served in the cavalry throughout the war, ending with the rank of a junior non-commissioned officer. He was wounded twice during the war and awarded the
During the
In 1921, he commanded the 35th Independent Cavalry Regiment stationed in Irkutsk and played an important role in bringing Damdin Sükhbaatar, the founder of the Mongolian People's Republic, to power.[11]
Rokossovsky met his future wife in Mongolia: Julia Barminan was a high school teacher who was fluent in four languages and who had studied Greek mythology.[12] They married in 1923. Their daughter Ariadna was born in 1925.[citation needed]
In 1924 and 1925 Rokossovsky attended the Leningrad Higher Cavalry School, where he first met
It was in the early 1930s that Rokossovsky's military career first became closely intertwined those of Semyon Timoshenko and Georgy Zhukov: when Rokossovsky was the commander of the 7th Samara Cavalry Division, Timoshenko served as his superior Corps commander and Zhukov was a brigade commander under Rokossovsky in his division.[10] Both became principal actors in his life during World War II, where he served directly under each at different times. Rokossovsky was noted for having a rivalry with Zhukov throughout World War II. He commented on Zhukov's character in an official report :[13]
Has a strong will. Decisive and firm. Often demonstrates initiative and skillfully applies it. Disciplined. Demanding and persistent in his demands. A somewhat ungracious and not sufficiently sympathetic person. Rather stubborn. Painfully proud. In professional terms well trained. Broadly experienced as a military leader... Absolutely cannot be used in staff or teaching jobs because constitutionally he hates them.
Rokossovsky was among the first to realize the potential of
Purge and rehabilitation
Rokossovsky held senior commands until August 1937 when he became caught up in
Some officers were swept up on suspicion due to past associations; in Rokossovky's case his Polish ancestry, association with the Special Red Banner Far Eastern Army, and the intrigues surrounding Marshal Vasily Blyukher may have been enough to cause his arrest. Blyukher was arrested shortly after Rokossovsky and died in prison without 'confessing'.[14]
Rokossovsky, however, survived. He was variously accused of having links to Polish and Japanese intelligence[3] and having committed acts of sabotage under Article 58, section 14; "conscious non-execution or deliberately careless execution of defined duties", a section added to the penal code in June 1937.
The charges against Rokossovsky stemmed from the case of the "Anti-Soviet Trotskyist Military Organization of the 11th Mechanized Corps". Rokossovsky was implicated after the arrest of Corps Commander Kasyan Chaykovsky who, like Rokossovsky, served in the Far East in the early 1930s. The Intelligence Chief of the Transbaikal Military District accused Rokossovsky of meeting with Colonel Komatsubara, the head of the Japanese military mission in Harbin in 1932, when he was commander of the 15th Cavalry Division in Trans-Baikal. Rokossovsky did not dispute the fact of the meeting but said that it was to resolve issues regarding Chinese prisoners. Material charges against him claimed various acts of negligence of command that were interpreted as deliberate acts of sabotage (known as "wrecking"), such as allowing the quarters of his division to become slovenly, failing to conduct training, and leading his division out into bad weather causing losses of horses and encouraging sickness among his troops.[15][16][17]
When Rokossovsky was arrested by the NKVD, his wife and daughter were sent into internal exile. His wife Julia took odd jobs to support her and their daughter, but she was repeatedly fired when it was discovered that her husband had been arrested as a "traitor".[12]
V. V. Rachesky, a cell mate of Rokossovsky, wrote in his memoirs that Rokossovsky blamed the persecution of innocent people on the NKVD. He thought the officer to be "naive", refusing to acknowledge Stalin's role in creating the treacherous environment. He described Rokossovsky's refusal to sign a false confession:
Those who refused to sign a false statement were beaten up, as long as the false statement was not signed. There were steadfast people who stubbornly did not sign. But there were relatively few. K. K. Rokossovsky, as he sat with me in the same cell, did not sign a false statement. But he was a brave and strong man, tall and broad-shouldered. He too was beaten.[16]
His grandson, Colonel Konstantin Rokossovsky Vilevich, later said that his grandfather escaped execution because he refused to sign a false statement and proved to the court that the officer who his NKVD accusers claimed had denounced him had in fact been killed in 1920 during the civil war:
The evidence was based on the testimony of Adolph Yushkevich, a colleague of my grandfather in the Civil War. But my grandfather knew very well that Yushkevich died in Perekop. He said that he would sign [a confession] if Adolph was brought for a confrontation. They looked for Yushkevich and found that he had died long before.[18]
In his famous "secret speech" of 1956, Nikita Khrushchev, spoke about the purges and was likely referring implicitly to Rokossovsky when he stated, "suffice to say that those of them who managed to survive, despite severe tortures to which they were subjected in the prisons, have from the first war days shown themselves real patriots and heroically fought for the glory of the Fatherland".[20]
World War II
After his trial Rokossovsky was sent to the
1941: Operation Barbarossa; Dubno, Smolensk and Moscow
The German army is a machine, and machines can be broken![21]
Battle of Dubno
When Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union in June 1941 Rokossovsky was serving as the commander of the 9th Mechanized Corps with the 35th and 20th Tank Divisions, and the 131st Motorized Division under his command.
He was immediately engaged in the early tank battles that raged around the Lutsk–Dubno–Brody triangle, also known as the Battle of Brody — an early Soviet counter-attack that was the most significant Soviet tank operation of the early stages of Operation Barbarossa.
The battle involved a large scale attack involving five
Upon receiving his orders Rokossovsky, whose divisions were stationed far to the rear of the frontier, had to commandeer trucks from the local reserve to carry munitions, and mount some of his infantry on tanks while the rest were forced to walk, splitting his forces.
On 25 June, Rokossosky's 131st Motorized were quickly driven out of their position at Lutsk by the
As German resistance stiffened, Mikhail Kirponos, the commander of the Southwestern Front, issued instructions to cease offensive operations that were immediately countermanded by his superior, Chief of General Staff G.K. Zhukov, who was visiting the headquarters. Zhukov insisted that the counter-attack continue against any counterarguments. As a result, Rokossovsky's command was bombarded with conflicting orders. According to Lieutenant-General Dmitry Ryabyshev, Rokossovsky "expressed no ambivalence about the proposed counteroffensive"[25] and refused a direct order, effectively ending the dispute between Zhukov and Kirponos:
We had once again received an order to counterattack. However, the enemy outnumbered us to such a degree, that I took on the personal responsibility of ordering to halt the counteroffensive and to meet the enemy in prepared defences.[25]
— Konstantin Rokossovsky
Because of this, Ryabyshev's 8th Mechanized, which had also scored some early successes operating out of Brody, was in effect continuing to attack from the south with the expectation of support from Rokossovsky, who had stood down his forces, and did not arrive from the north. Neither were aware of this fact, because there was no available direct communication between the individual corps, an example of how the endemic communication problems helped foil the Soviet efforts.[25]
Throughout the next days, Rokossovsky's forces put considerable pressure on the Germans at Lutsk and tried to recapture Rovno in their rear, while stopping the advance of the 14th Panzer by ambushing them with 85mm anti-tank guns at close range and with good effect. He observed in his memoirs that "the terrain off-road was wooded and swampy, keeping the German advance to the road. The artillery Regiment of the 20th Tank division deployed its newly issued 85mm guns to cover the road and with direct fire repulsed the advancing Panzers.[24]
The battles around Lutsk, Dubno and Brody fought by the 8th, 9th and 19th Mechanized Corps were most notable among Soviet operations in the early days of Barbarossa because the Southwestern Front was able to organize active operations, unlike most sectors of the front where the German assault was met with operational paralysis, and bought time to reorganize defense along the line of the old Polish border.[26]
Sporadic attempts were made to close the widening gap between the Soviet 5th and 6th Armies, as the Germans advanced on Kiev, but the Soviet tank forces were but a fraction of their former strength. By 7 July, Rokossovsky's 9th Mechanized Corps had been reduced to 64 tanks, out of its original complement of 316.[27]
Battle of Smolensk
While Rokossovsky and his fellow Mechanized Corps commanders of the 5th and 6th Army had been interdicting Army Group South's advance in Ukraine, complete disorder and panic gripped the Soviet forces in
The Battle of Smolensk commenced on 10 July when Army Group Center began advancing on a broad front to the north and south banks of the Dnepr river, just beyond the bend where it begins its southward flow.
The
Despite his insubordination during the Battle of Dubno, Rokossovsky was ordered to Moscow on 13 July to take command of the remnants of the 4th Army[30] where he was to serve under Marshal Timoshenko who had replaced the disgraced Pavlov as the Western Front commander on 2 July, shortly after he and the majority of his staff had been tried and shot in the wake of the disaster at the frontier.[31]
On 15 July, the same day that Rokossovsky was restored to the rank of lieutenant general, the rank he had held previous to his arrest,
With his front rapidly deteriorating Timoshenko released Rokossovsky from 4th Army (a command he had assumed in name only) and gave him the task of assembling a stopgap formation to be called "Group Yartsevo"[30] that would deal with the emergency presented by the sudden appearance of the 7th Panzer at Yartsevo. This ad hoc operational group was to defend the bridgeheads of the Vop river, a tributary of the Dnepr, and prevent the southern and northern wings of the Panzer envelopment from converging at the Dnepr.[33]
Collapse seemed imminent. Stalin, unmoved, reiterated his demand to Timoshenko that Smolensk should not be surrendered and called the "evacuation attitude" of the front-line commanders of the besieged armies criminally "treasonous". Rather than retreat, Timoshenko's armies would stand their ground and attempt to recapture Smolensk.[30]
"Group Yartsevo" was in theory a large army-sized formation, but when Rokossovsky arrived at Timoshenko's headquarters on the evening of the 17th, he was in fact in charge of his own small staff, two quad anti-aircraft machine guns mounted on trucks and a radio van.
What commenced was a confusing seesaw battle for control of Smolensk that saw portions of the city change hands several times over the next week, while Rokossovsky's group held the back door open and harassed the advanced German panzer formations.
Then we began going over to the offense by delivering blows against the Germans, first in one sector and then in another, frequently scoring appreciable tactical success, which helped strengthen discipline among the troops and strengthened the confidence of the officers and men, who saw that they could actually beat the enemy, which meant a lot at that time. Our activity apparently puzzled the enemy command, which encountered resistance where it was not expected; they saw that our troops not only fought back but also attacked (even if not always successfully). This tended to create an exaggerated idea of our forces in the sector, and the enemy failed to take advantage of his great superiority.[36]
— Konstantin Rokossovsky
Day by day, Rokossovsky's forces became stronger. As the Smolensk pocket deflated under German pressure Rokossovsky was able to press into service retreating soldiers and formations that slipped out of the pocket and employed them reinforcing the perimeter of the Yartsevo corridor. Eventually, the 38th Rifle Division was handed over to Rokossovsky when Timoshenko rationalized the command of the shrinking formations in the Smolensk pocket by disbanding Ivan Konev's 19th Army.[34]
The Germans were faced with the dilemma of both containing the encircled armies, and dealing with Rokossovsky's burgeoning forces to their east. The 7th Panzer was soon joined by the 12th Panzer at Yartsevo, while the 20th held down their northern flank.[36] With so many Panzer divisions tied down in defensive position containing Soviet activity both inside and outside of the pocket, much of the offensive punch of the Panzer Groups was blunted.[37]
Even though "Group Yartsevo" had managed to halt the advance of Hoth's 3rd Panzer Group at Yartsevo, Guderian's 2nd Panzer Group continued to advance south of the Dnepr on Rokossovsky's left flank, becoming a more tangible threat with each passing day. On 18 July, Guderian's 10th Panzer Division entered the town of Yelnya 70 km south of Yartsevo and captured it on the 20th.[37]
But on 19 July, German operational objectives for Smolensk changed when Hitler issued
On 20 July, Zhukov ordered a general counterattack with the aim of relieving the encircled armies, and beginning on 21 July attacks began along the entire front, and continued for a number of days in an uncoordinated fashion.[38] Meanwhile, the defenders in the pocket increased their efforts to recapture Smolensk. Attacks were made from the south against the flank of Guderian's advanced forces at Yelnya and Roslavl, and north of Yartsevo against Hoth's 2nd Panzer Group. Deep cavalry penetrations were made behind the German front behind Mogilev, disrupting logistics. Uncoordinated as the attacks were they had the effect of distracting the German advance for several days as intense battles took place increasing casualties on both sides. On the 24th Rokossovky's temporarily drove Funk's 7th Panzer from Yartsevo.[39]
Unsupported by infantry the Wehrmacht advanced Panzer formations were taking inordinate casualties. To make further headway, both Hoth and Guderian needed to bring infantry forward to disentangle their mobile forces from their containment operations, and free them for attack, slowing the pace of advance.[40]
By 25 July, Guderian had been able to free his considerable tank forces from defensive duties, and mobilized the 17th Panzer Division for a concerted effort to advance north and clear Rokossovsky from his tenuous position, but the 17th Panzer was still unable to reach the Dnepr and finally close the pocket.[41] Nonetheless, under attack from north and south Rokossovsky was unable to prevent Hoth's 20th Motorized Infantry from capturing bridgeheads over the Dnepr on the 27th, sealing the pocket.[41] The encircled armies fought intense breakout battles, and on the 28th Timoshenko ordered Rokossovsky to reopen the corridor by recapturing the bridgeheads. While he was unable to regain control of the river crossings, the 101st Tank Division recaptured Yartsevo on the 29th and held it for a few critical days.[42]
Despite strenuous efforts over the next week, Rokossovsky was not able to secure a link to the armies in the pocket, but the intense Soviet activity kept the Germans from consolidating their front, allowing elements of the encircled 16th army to effect a breakout. By 4 August the front had stabilized and the defending armies within the pocket ceased resistance or had ceased to exist.
Rokossovsky is credited with slowing the German attack, and holding the Yartsevo corridor open for long enough to prevent the capture and destruction of a considerable numbers of Soviet troops.[43] The broader consequences of Soviet resistance at Smolensk are evident in the Führer Directive No. 34, issued on 30 July 1941:
The development of the situation in the last few days, the appearance of strong enemy forces on the front and to the flanks of Army Group Centre, the supply position, and the need to give 2nd and 3rd Armoured Groups about ten days to rehabilitate their units, make it necessary to postpone for the moment the further tasks and objectives laid down in Directive 33 of 19th July and in the Supplement of 23rd July.[44]
— Adolf Hitler
Battle of Moscow
In September 1941 Stalin personally appointed Rokossovsky to the command of 16th Army. He was ordered to defend the approaches to
On 18 November, during the last-ditch efforts of the
1942: Operation Fall Blau
In March 1942 Rokossovsky was badly injured by a piece of shrapnel. It was widely rumored that Valentina Serova was a mistress of Rokossovsky during this time. While it is true that Serova, working as a hospital volunteer, met Rokossovsky several times while he was recovering from his wound, it is not acknowledged they were lovers.[45] Evidence for their close relationship was found in the accounts of frontline soldiers. [46] Rokossovsky also had another mistress at this time, Dr. Lt. Galina Talanova, with whom he had a daughter in 1945.[47] After two months in a Moscow hospital Rokossovsky was reunited briefly with the 16th Army.
Retreat to the Don
During 1942 the Wehrmacht commenced "
On 13 July 1942 Rokossovsky was given his first operational level command, a sign of his growing stature. The battles of Smolensk and Moscow had by no measure resulted in Red Army victory, but the front-line formations under his command were central to frustrating the Wehrmacht efforts to achieve the same[48] and this was most likely reflected in Stalin's decision to make him commander of the Bryansk Front,[49] where Stavka expected the main line of German attack to be renewed against Moscow in 1942—Rokossovsky was a trusted officer who could be counted on in a tight squeeze.
As the German offensive turned south, and toward Voronezh, the Bryansk sector turned out to be so quiet that Stavka shuffled the 38th Army to
The plan was to concentrate a strong force (no less than three combined armies and several armoured corps) on the flank of the enemy occupying the country between the Don and the Volga with the purpose of counter-attacking south and south-east from the vicinity of Serafimovich.[51]
Subsequent events delayed the attack and it was shelved, only later to be resurrected as "Operation Uranus" with Vatutin playing the lead role, however Walsh asserts that Rokossovsky being originally selected to lead the attack "was symptomatic of his standing and the importance of his location as an indicator of significant, impending Soviet operations."[48]
Operation Uranus
By the fall of 1942 the German army had pulled up along the new Soviet defense at the Don and Volga rivers, centered at Stalingrad, and had broken through south of Rostov toward the strategic oil centers of Tbilisi and Baku. Stalin was determined that Stalingrad should not fall, and the Red Army was given strict orders to hold the city at any cost. The Battle of Stalingrad became a struggle for control of the city that drew in combatants from both sides in brutal house-to-house fighting.
On 28 September 1942, at Zhukov's urging, Rokossovsky was given overall command of the
With German forces heavily engaged at Stalingrad and spread thinly due to their deep penetrations into the Caucasus, the Wehrmacht was increasingly reliant on their Romanian and Italian allies to cover the flanks of their extended line, on the north along the Don, and to the south along the Volga. "Operation Uranus" kicked off on 17 November with the intention of making a double envelopment of Paulus's men at Stalingrad by breaking through the flanks. The
In less than a week, in the face of deteriorating weather and blizzard conditions, the Soviet forces had sealed the gap behind Stalingrad, and had begun to reinforce their investment around the city in order to prevent an attempted escape. No organized effort was made by the 6th Army to break out, and "Operation Winter Storm", a mid December German effort to relieve the encircled army, failed to break the Soviet defenses. Soon after, the Soviets launched "Operation Little Saturn" and completely consolidated their position.
Stalingrad
On 28 December Stalin gave Rokossovsky the task of mopping up the Stalingrad pocket. He had at his disposal roughly 212,000 men, 6,500 guns, 2,500 tanks, and 300 aircraft,
On 10 January, the Don Front launched "Operation Ring" to reduce the Stalingrad pocket beginning with a 55-minute barrage from 7000 rocket launchers, artillery and mortars.[55] The defenders fought tenaciously, even as their lines slowly collapsed, causing the Don Front 26,000 casualties, and destroying half its tanks in the first three days of the operation.[56]
On 15 January Rokossovsky was promoted to the rank of colonel general.[57]
On 16 January the main airfield used to supply the beleaguered 6th Army fell, and then after a pause of a few days, the offensive was renewed capturing the last operational airfield and finally driving the German back into the city proper on 22 January.
On that same day General Paulus asked Hitler for permission to surrender but was refused. On 26 January the Soviets had broken the surrounded Germans into two pockets, and on 31 January, the southern pocket collapsed and Paulus surrendered. Within four days the last significant group of defenders surrendered to Rokossovky's command, finally ending the battle that marked the high-water mark of the German advance during the Soviet–German war.[58]
The troops of the Don Front at 4 pm on February 2nd, 1943 completed the rout and destruction of the encircled group of enemy forces in Stalingrad. Twenty-two divisions have been destroyed or taken prisoner.[59]
— Konstantin Rokossovsky
1943: Kursk
After the victory at Stalingrad the Russian forces advanced to a position that created a bulge 150 km deep and 250 km wide into the German line, around the city of
In February 1943 Rokossovsky wrote in his diary: "I'm appointed commander of the
Both the Red Army and the Wehrmacht prepared to make a decisive offensive in the summer of 1943 at Kursk. The Germans planned to drive two thrusts, one through each flank of the salient, and unite them at Kursk in order to cut off substantial Soviet forces, recover from the strategic loss at Stalingrad, and curtail further Russian advance. The Russians, alert to the coming attack, put their offensive plans aside and prepared for defense in depth with mass antitank units in prepared positions.
In late June one German bomb load in a night raid hit Rokossovsky's HQ, and he escaped only because on a whim he had decided to set up his signals group in the officers' mess. After that, Central Front HQ went underground in a bunker in the garden of a former monastery.[60]
The German offensive, code named "Operation Citadel", was originally scheduled to begin in May but the attack was delayed several times in order to bring up fresh Panzer formations equipped with Tiger I's and Panther tanks and their latest assault guns. These delays allowed for even greater Soviet preparation. It was not until early July that the Wehrmacht operations in the Kursk salient got underway.
The resulting battle was one of the largest tank battles in World War II, with massive losses of men and equipment on both sides. As the commander of the Central Front, Rokossovsky's force was faced with a determined attack by the
Needless to say the Russians exploited their victory to the full. There were to be no more periods of quiet on the Eastern Front. From now on, the enemy was in undisputed possession of the initiative.[62]
The Central Front was then renamed
1944: Operation Bagration and the Warsaw Uprising
During the planning of the major Soviet offensive, Operation Bagration, in 1944, a famous incident occurred that various sources consistently report in slightly different versions. Rokossovsky disagreed with Stalin, who demanded in accordance with Soviet war practice a single break-through of the German frontline. Rokossovsky held firm in his argument for two points of break-through. Stalin ordered Rokossovsky to "go and think it over" three times, but every time he returned and gave the same answer "two break-throughs, comrade Stalin, two break-throughs". After the third time Stalin remained silent, but walked over to Rokossovsky and put a hand on his shoulder. A tense moment followed as the whole room waited for Stalin to rip the epaulette from Rokossovsky's shoulder; instead, Stalin said "Your confidence speaks for your sound judgement", and ordered the attack to go forward according to Rokossovsky's plan.[12][63]
The battle was successful and Rokossovsky's reputation was assured. After crushing German Army Group Centre in Belarus, Rokossovsky's armies reached the east bank of the
As Rokossovsky's approached the
In November 1944, Rokossovsky was transferred to the
In July 1945, he, Zhukov and several other Soviet officers were awarded the Order of the Bath in a ceremony at the Brandenburg Gate, in Berlin.
Post-war life
As one of the most prominent Soviet military commanders of the
After the end of the war Rokossovsky remained in command of Soviet forces in Poland (
In 1952 he became deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers of the
Rokossovsky played a key role in the regime's suppression of an independent Poland through
In the June 1956
In the wake of the Poznan riots and the "rehabilitation" of the formerly imprisoned communist reformer
Throughout his life, he was fond of hunting – he had a double-barreled IZh-49 12 gauge shotgun and a 20 gauge double-barreled TOZ shotgun made in 1905.[71]
Rokossovsky died on 3 August 1968, of prostate cancer in Moscow, aged 71. His ashes were buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis on Red Square.
Dates of rank
- promoted major general, 4 June 1940
- promoted lieutenant general, 14 July 1941
- promoted colonel general, 15 January 1943
- promoted army general, 28 April 1943
- promoted Marshal of the Soviet Union, 29 June 1944
- declared Marshal of Poland 2 November 1949
Family
Rokossovsky and his wife Julia had a daughter named Ariadna (1925–1978).[72] During World War II, he met military doctor Galina Talanova, with whom he had an illegitimate daughter named Nadezhda (born 1945).[73][74]
Rokossovsky's great-granddaughter Ariadna Rokossovska (born 1980) works as a journalist for the Russian newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta.[75][76]
Honours and awards
- Russian Empire:
- Cross of St. George, 4th class
- Medal of St. George, 2nd, 3rd and 4th class
- Soviet Union:
- "Gold Star" Hero of the Soviet Union, twice (29 July 1944, 1 June 1945)
- Order of Victory (No. 4 – 30 March 1945)
- Orders of Lenin(16 August 1936, 2 January 1942, 29 July 1944, 21 February 1945, 26 December 1946, 20 December 1956, 20 December 1966)
- Order of the October Revolution (22 February 1968)
- Order of the Red Banner, six times (23 May 1920, 2 December 1921, 22 February 1930, 22 July 1941, 3 November 1944, 6 November 1947)
- Order of Suvorov, 1st class (28 January 1943)
- Order of Kutuzov, 1st class (27 August 1943)
- Medal "For the Defence of Stalingrad" (22 December 1942)
- Medal "For the Defence of Moscow" (1 May 1944)
- Medal "For the Defence of Kiev"(21 June 1961)
- Medal "For the Liberation of Warsaw" (9 June 1945)
- Medal "For the Capture of Königsberg" (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" (9 May 1945)
- Jubilee Medal "Twenty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"(7 May 1965)
- 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" (18 December 1957)
- Jubilee Medal "50 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR" (26 December 1967)
- Medal "In Commemoration of the 800th Anniversary of Moscow"
- Honorary weapon – sword inscribed with golden national emblem of the Soviet Union (1968)
- Polish People's Republic:
- Order of the Builders of People's Poland (1951)
- Order of the Cross of Grunwald, 1st class (1945)
- Grand Cross of the Virtuti Militari (1945)
- Medal "For Warsaw 1939-1945"(1946)
- Medal "For Oder, Neisse and the Baltic"(1946)
- Medal of Victory and Freedom 1945 (1946)
- China:
- Denmark:
- France:
- Legion d'Honneur(9 June 1945)
- Croix de guerre(1945)
- Mongolian People's Republic:
- Order of Sukhbaatar (18 March 1961)
- Order of the Red Banner (1943)
- Order of Friendship (1967)
- United Kingdom:
- Honorary Knight-Commander of the Order of the Bath, (military division) (1945)
- United States:
- Chief Commander of the Legion of Merit (1946)
Monuments and Memorial
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Monument to Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Rokossovsky in Ulan-Ude, Russia
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Monuments to Rokossovsky in Volgograd
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Monument to Rokossovsky in Soviet Army and Polish People's Army Museum in Uniejowice, Poland
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Bulvar Rokossovskogo, Moscow Metro station
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Bulvar Rokossovskogo, Moscow Central Circle station.
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Aeroflot, Sukhoi Superjet 100, RA-89116 ('K. Rokossovsky').
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Commemorative coin of Belarus, 2010.
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Postage stamp of Soviet Union, 1976.
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Postal cover of Russia, 1996.
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Postage stamp of Russia, 2004.
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Postage stamp of Kyrgyzstan, 2005.
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Postage stamp of Russia, 2021.
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Rokossovsky's tomb in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis
Notelist
References
- ^ a b c Рокоссовский Константин Константинович Archived 27 October 2020 at the Wayback Machine. Great Russian Encyclopedia
- ISBN 978-0061885488.
- ^ a b c d e Биография маршала Советского Союза Константина Рокоссовского [Biography of Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Rokossovsky] (in Russian). Archived from the original on 13 February 2009. Retrieved 9 May 2009. site dedicated to Rokossovsky
- ^ "Герой Сталинградской и Курской битв". Russianmontreal.ca. 3 August 2013. Retrieved 20 March 2023.
- ^ "Комдив Рокоссовский". Archived from the original on 29 November 2014. Retrieved 17 November 2014.
- ^ "Маршал Рокоссовский". Liveinternet.ru. Retrieved 20 March 2023.
- ISBN 978-5457275003.
- ^ a b "Рокоссовский Константин Константинович" [Rokossovsky Konstantin Konstantinovich]. www.warheroes.ru (in Russian). Retrieved 18 January 2016.
- ^ "Биография маршала Советского Союза Константина Рокоссовского". Archived from the original on 13 February 2009. Retrieved 9 May 2009.
- ^ a b c d Kudrevatykh, Leonid. "Maturity of Talent". War Heroes.
- ^ "The History of Kyakhta". Archived from the original on 21 July 2011. Retrieved 6 April 2011.
- ^ a b c d Rudenko, Inna (7 May 2009). "Great-granddaughter of Marshal Rokossovsky: My great-grandfather commanded the Victory Parade". kp.ru.
- ISBN 978-0262611381.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-89141-564-0.
- ^ "Military History magazine 2006. – № 5". War Heroes.
- ^ a b "The Kremlin Wall Memorial Project". Archived from the original on 19 June 2013.
- ^ Rayzfeld, A (17 February 2011). "Battering Ram". Soviet Russia: Independent People's Newspaper. Vol. 2, no. 23. Archived from the original on 24 June 2014. Retrieved 28 October 2013.
- ^ "Konstantin Rokossovsky: Brezhnev was crying at the funeral of my grandfather". FreeLance Bureau.
- ISBN 978-1-57607-208-0.
- ^ Khrushchev, Nikita (24 February 1956). "Speech to 20th Congress of the C.P.S.U". Marxists.org. Retrieved 20 March 2023.
- ^ Block, Maxine; Rothe, Anna Herthe; Candee, Marjorie Dent (1945). Current Biography Yearbook. Vol. 5. H.W. Wilson. p. 562.
- ISBN 978-0-7603-3434-8.
- ISBN 978-0-7603-3434-8.
- ^ Glantz, David(1987). The Initial Period of War on the Eastern Front. Routledge.
- ^ a b c Rjabyshev, D.I. On the role of the 8th Mechanized Corps in the June 1941 counteroffensive mounted by the South-Western Front. battlefield.ru. Archived from the original on 25 October 2009.
- ISBN 1842124269.
- ISBN 1842124269.
- ISBN 0891414916.
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 91
- ^ a b c d Glantz (2010), p. 163
- ISBN 0891414916.
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 161
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 167
- ^ a b Glantz (2010), p. 166
- ^ Glantz (2010), pp. 166–169
- ^ a b Glantz (2010), p. 168
- ^ a b c d Glantz (2010), p. 187
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 195
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 224
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 186
- ^ a b Glantz (2010), p. 241
- ^ Glantz (2010), p. 242
- ]
- ^ Glantz, David (2011). Operation Barbarossa. The History Press. p. 76.
- Braithwaite, Rodric; Moscow, 1941, Vintage Books, New York, 2006, p. 295
- ISBN 978-0811735995.
- ^ Braithwaite, Rodric; Moscow, 1941, Vintage Books, New York, 2006, p. 208
- ^ hdl:1826/4315.
- ^ Zolotarev, V. A., ed. (1996). Russkiy Arkhiv: Velikaya Otechestvennaya (in Russian). Vol. 16–5. Moscow: TERRA. p. 308.
Stavka Order No:170507
- ^ Zolotarev, V. A., ed. (1996). Russkiy Arkhiv: Velikaya Otechestvennaya (in Russian). Vol. 16–5. Moscow: TERRA. p. 378.
Stavka VGK Directive No:170593
- ^ ISBN 5-94850-001-2.
- ^ "Rokossovsky, Konstantin". Encyclopedia of World War II, Volume II.
- ^ Beevor, Antony and Erickson, John (1993) The Road to Stalingrad via The Stalingrad Academy of Street Fighting Archived 14 February 2008 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Lotz, Corinna. "Why Stalingrad Still Matters". A World to Win.
- ^ a b Beevor, p. 353
- ^ Beevor, p. 356
- ^ "Konstantin Rokossovsky". World War II Database.
- ^ Beevor, pp. 364–394
- ^ Werth, Alexander (1964) Russia at War, 1941–1945. Barrie & Rockliff. p. 543
- ISBN 0-300-07813-7.
- OCLC 40117106.
- ISBN 978-1-903223-91-8.
- ISBN 978-0-330-51004-2.
- ISBN 0-231-05351-7)
- ^ ISBN 83-7001-755-X.
- ^ ISSN 1641-9561. Archived from the originalon 22 March 2005. Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ^ a b Zdrzenicka, Anna Witalis (2005). "Polski gułag. Zapomniana krzywda powraca (Polish Gulag: the Forgotten Lesion Returns)". Gazeta Ogólnopolska (in Polish). 1 (1). Archived from the original on 24 December 2007. Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ISBN 0-472-08830-0.
- ^ according to official figures, as in: Maciej Szewczyk (2005). "Poznański czerwiec 1956". Poznańczyk (in Polish). Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ^ "Wprost 24 – Rezydent Wolski" (in Polish). Wprost.pl. 19 June 2005. Retrieved 20 March 2023.
- ^ Maltsev, V. (1986). "Полководцы-охотники" [Warlords-hunters]. Охота и охотничье хозяйство. 12: 26–28.
- ^ "Интересный факт: Константин Рокоссовский познакомился с женой в Бурятии". Baikal Go. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
- ^ "Внебрачные и великие. Кому грех не помеха стать и знаменитыми и уважаемыми". aif.ru. 27 October 2010. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
- ^ "Константин Рокоссовский. Больше, чем любовь". YouTube. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
- ^ "Z wizytą u prawnuczki Rokossowskiego – Ariadny". Dzień Dobry TVN. 25 October 2016. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
- ^ "Świat wspomina Wajdę. "Umarł człowiek z żelaza polskiego kina"". Wiadomosci. 10 October 2016. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
Cited sources
- Beevor, Antony (1998). ISBN 0-14-024985-0.
- Glantz, David (2010). Barbarossa Derailed. Casemate Publishers. ISBN 978-1906033729.
External links
- Soviet newsreels about Konstantin Rokossovsky // Net-Film Newsreels and Documentary Films Archive
- Rokossowski speech on National Unity Congress in Poland (December 1949)
- Герой Сталинградской и Курской битв
- Комдив Рокоссовский Archived 29 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine
- Маршал Рокоссовский
- Newspaper clippings about Konstantin Rokossovsky in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW