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Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov (Russian
language|Russian:
Гео́рги&#
1081;
Констан&
#1090;и́нови

095; Жу́ков)
(December 1, 1896 (Gregorian calendar|N.S.);
November 19, 1896 (Julian calendar|O.S.)) - June
18, 1974), Soviet Union|Soviet military commander
and politician, considered by many as one of the
most successful field commanders of World War II.

==Prewar career==

Born into a peasant family in Strelkovka,
Maloyaroslavets Raion, Kaluga Guberniya (now
Zhukovo Raion Kaluga Oblast), Zhukov was
apprenticed to work in Moscow, and in 1915 was
conscripted into the army of the Russian Empire,
where he served in a dragoon regiment as a
private. During World War I, Zhukov was awarded
the Cross of St George twice and promoted to the
rank of non-commissioned officer for his bravery
in battle. He joined the Communist Party of the
Soviet Union|Bolshevik Party after the Russian
Revolution|October Revolution, and his background
of poverty became an asset. After recovering from
typhus he fought in the Russian Civil War from
1918 to 1920, receiving the Order of the Battle
Red Banner for subduing a non-communist(White)
incited peasant rebellion. 

By 1923 Zhukov was commander of a regiment, and in
1930 of a brigade. He was a keen proponent of the
new theory of armoured warfare and was noted for
his detailed planning, tough discipline and
strictness. He survived Joseph Stalin's Great
Purge of the Red Army command in 1937-1938|39.

In 1938 Zhukov was directed to command the First
Soviet Mongolian Army Group, and saw action
against Japan's Kwantung Army on the border
between Mongolia and the Japanese controlled state
of Manchukuo in an undeclared war that lasted from
1938 to 1939. What began as a routine border
skirmish—the Japanese testing the resolve of
the Soviets to defend their
territory—rapidly escalated into a
full-scale war, the Japanese pushing forward with
80,000 troops, 180 tanks and 450 aircraft. 

This led to the decisive Battle of Halhin Gol.
Zhukov requested major reinforcements and on
August 15, 1939 he ordered what seemed at first to
be a conventional frontal attack. However, Zhukov
had held back two tank brigades, which in a daring
and successful manouvere, he then ordered to
advance around both flanks of the battle.
Supported by motorized artillery and infantry, the
two mobile battle groups encircled the 6th
Japanese army and captured their vulnerable supply
areas. Within several days the Japanese troops
were defeated.  

For this operation Zhukov was awarded the title of
Hero of the Soviet Union. Outside of the Soviet
Union, however, this battle remained little-known,
as by this time World War II had begun. Zhukov's
pioneering use of mobile armour went unheeded by
the west, and in consequence the German Blitzkrieg
against France in 1940 came as a great surprise.

Promoted to full general in 1940, Zhukov was
briefly (in January - July 1941) chief of the Red
Army General Staff before a disagreement with
Stalin led to him being replaced by Marshal Boris
Shaposhnikov (who was in turn replaced by
Aleksandr Vasilevsky in 1942).

==World War II==



After the Operation Barbarossa|German invasion of
the Soviet Union in June 1941, (see Great
Patriotic War), Zhukov was fearless in his direct
criticisms of Stalin and other commanders. As a
result he was removed from the command staff and
was sent to the Leningrad Military District to
organise the city's defence.  He stopped the
German advance in Leningrad's southern outskirts
in autumn 1941. 

In October 1941, when the Germans closed in on
Moscow, Zhukov replaced Semyon Timoshenko in
command of the central front and was assigned to
direct the defense of Moscow (see Battle of
Moscow). He also directed the transfer of troops
from the Russian Far East|Far East, where a large
part of Soviet ground forces had been stationed on
the day of Hitler's invasion. A successful Soviet
counter-offensive in December 1941 drove the
Germans back, out of reach of the Soviet capital.
Zhukov's feat of logistics is considered by some
to be his greatest achievement.

By now Zhukov was firmly back in favour and Stalin
valued him precisely for his outspokensness.
Stalin's willingness to submit to criticism and
listen to his generals eventually contributed to
his success as a commander - whereas Hitler sacked
any general who disagreed with him. 

In 1942 Zhukov was made Deputy Commander-in-Chief
and sent to the south-western front to be in
charge of the defense of Stalingrad. Under the
overall command of Vasilievsky, he oversaw the
encirclement and capture of the German Sixth Army
in 1943 at the cost of perhaps a million dead (see
Battle of Stalingrad). During the Stalingrad
operation Zhukov spent most of the time in the
fruitless attacks in the directions of Rzhev,
Sychevka and Vyazma, known as "Battles of
Rzhev|Rzhev meat grinder"
("Ржевска
;я
мясоруб&
#1082;а"), nevertheless he claimed the
success at Stalingrad as his own, thus causing
Stalin to sign the order about the improper
behavior of Zhukov: 

"Contrary to Zhukov's claims, he doesn't have any
relation to plans of liquidation of the Stalingrad
group of German troops; it is known that the plan
was developed and started to be implemented in
winter of 1942, when Zhukov was with another
front, far from Stalingrad".


In January 1943 he orchestrated the first
break-through of the German blockade of Leningrad.
He was a STAVKA co-ordinator at the Battle of
Kursk in July 1943, playing a central role in the
planning of the Soviet defensive battle and the
hugely successful offensive operations that
followed it. Kursk represented the first major
defeat of the German blitzkrieg in summer
campaigning weather and has a good claim to be a
battle at least as decisive as Stalingard.

Following the failure of Marshal Kliment
Voroshilov, he successfully lifted the Siege of
Leningrad in January 1944. Zhukov led the Soviet
offensive of 1944 and the final assault on Germany
in 1945, capturing Berlin (see Battle of Berlin)
in April, and becoming the first commander of the
Soviet Union|Soviet occupation zone in Germany. As
the most prominent Soviet military commander of
the Great Patriotic War, Zhukov inspected the
Victory Parade on the Red Square in Moscow in
1945. Stalin, the supreme commander, was said to
be frightened of falling off his horse on the wet
cobbles of the Square.

General Eisenhower, the supreme Allied commander
in the West, was a great admirer of Zhukov and the
two toured the Soviet Union together in the
immediate aftermath of the victory over Germany.

==Postwar career==

A war hero and a leader hugely popular with the
military, Zhukov constituted a most serious
potential threat to Stalin's dictatorship. As a
result, in 1947 he was demoted to command the
Odessa military district (which was far away from
Moscow and lacking strategic significance and
attendant massive troops deployment). After
Stalin's death, however, Zhukov was returned to
favour and became Deputy Defense Minister (1953),
then Defense Minister (1955). 

In 1953 Zhukov supported the post-Stalin Communist
Party leadership in arresting (and eventually
executing) Lavrenty Beria, head of the state
security apparatus (several popular urban legends
in Russia contend that Zhukov himself made the
arrest while the Politburo was in session at the
Kremlin).

Zhukov, as Soviet defence minister, was
responsible for the invasion of Hungary in
October, 1956. Indeed he urged it on Khruschev.

In 1957 Zhukov supported Nikita Khrushchev against
his conservative enemies, the so-called
"Anti-Party Group" led by Vyacheslav Molotov.
Zhukov's speech to the plenum of the central
committee was the most powerful - directly
denouncing the neo-Stalinists for their complicity
in Stalin's crimes, though it also carried the
threat of force: the very crime he was accusing
the others of.

In June that year he was made a full member of the
Presidium of the Central Committee of the
Communist Party. He had, however, significant
political disagreements with Khrushchev in matters
of army policy. Khruschev scaled down the
conventional forces and the navy, while developing
the strategic nuclear forces as a primary
deterrent force, hence freeing up the manpower and
the resources for the civilian economy. 

Zhukov supported the interests of the military and
disagreed with Khrushchev's policy. Khrushchev,
demonstrating the dominance of the Party over the
army, relieved Zhukov of his ministry and expelled
him from the Central Committee (October 1957). In
his memoirs, Khrushchev claimed that he believed
that Zhukov was planning a coup against him and
that he accused Zhukov of this as grounds for
expulsion at the Central Committee meeting. 

After Khrushchev was deposed in October 1964 the
new leadership of Leonid Brezhnev and Aleksei
Kosygin restored Zhukov to favour, though not to
power. Brezhnev was said to be angered when, at a
gathering to mark the twentieth of anniversary of
victory in the Great Patriotic War, Zhukov was
accorded greater acclaim than himself. Brezhnev, a
relatively junior political officer in the war,
was always concerned to boost his own importance
in the victory. 

Zhukov remained a popular figure in the Soviet
Union until his death in 1974. He was buried with
full military honors. 

Asteroid 2132 Zhukov was named after him. In 1995,
commemorating Zhukov's 100th birthday, the Russian
Federation adopted the Zhukov Order and the Zhukov
Medal.

An Ambassador class starship USS Zhukov
(NCC-62136) was mentioned in an American science
fiction television series Star Trek: The Next
Generation.

== Awards ==
Zhukov was a recipient of numerous awards. In
particular, he was four times Hero of the Soviet
Union; besides him, only Leonid Brezhnev was a
four times hero. Zhukov was one of three double
recipients of the Order of Victory. Zhukov was
also awarded the Polish Virtuti Militari, with the
Grand Cross and Star and the Chief Commander grade
of the American Legion of Merit.

==External links==

Commons|Π“Π΅ΠΎΡ€Π³ΠΈΠΉ
ΠšΠΎΠ½ΡΡ‚Π°Π½Ρ‚ΠΈΠ½ΠΎΠ²ΠΈΡ‡ Π–ΡƒΠΊΠΎΠ²

*http://militera.lib.ru/memo/russian/zhukov1/index
.html Воспоминания ΠΈ
Ρ€Π°Π·ΠΌΡ‹ΡˆΠ»Π΅Π½ΠΈΡ The Memoirs of Georgy
Zhukov (in Russian)
*http://www.ordenshop.ru/photjuk.html Zhukov's
Awards (also in Russian)