29. Stalin’s Missteps Before the German Invasion of 1941
No country has ever suffered losses as horrific at the start of war as the Soviet Union suffered during the opening months of the German invasion in 1941. The seeds were planted years earlier, during Stalin’s Military Purge, which began in 1937.
That brutal ideological cleansing of the armed forces threw the Soviet military into turmoil by removing its most experienced commanders: 13 of 15 army commanders, 8 of 9 admirals, 50 of 57 corps commanders, all 16 army commissars, and 25 of 28 army corps commissars.