Aleksandr Mikhaylovich Vasilevsky (30 September [O.S. 10 September] 1895 – 5 December 1977) was a Soviet general who served as a top commander during World War II and achieved the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union. During World War II, he served as the chief of the General Staff and deputy Minister of Defense, and later served as Minister of Defense from 1949 to 1953.
Born in central Russia, Vasilevsky began his military career in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I and earned the rank of captain by 1917. After the October Revolution of 1917 and the start of the Russian Civil War, he was conscripted into the Red Army and took part in the Polish-Soviet War. Following the war, Vasilevsky quickly rose through the ranks, and in 1931 was appointed to the Directorate of Military Training. In 1939, after Joseph Stalin's Great Purge, he was appointed deputy chief of operations of the Red Army.
Soon after the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, Vasilevsky was promoted to chief of operations and deputy chief of the general staff on the recommendation of his mentor Boris Shaposhnikov. In June 1942, he succeeded Shaposhnikov as chief of the general staff, and also became deputy minister of defense that October. In these capacities, Vasilevsky coordinated fronts and often planned offensives in collaboration with Georgy Zhukov, particularly at the Battle of Kursk in 1943 and in Operation Bagration in 1944. He was made a Marshal of the Soviet Union in February 1943 after playing a key role at the Battle of Stalingrad. In February 1945, Vasilevsky gained command of the 3rd Belorussian Front in Germany and stepped down as chief of the general staff. After Germany's surrender, he was appointed commander-in-chief of Soviet forces in the Far East in July 1945 and carried out the invasion of Manchuria that August.
After the war, Vasilevsky again served as chief of the general staff from 1946 to 1948, and as Soviet Defense Minister from 1949 until after Stalin's death in 1953. After Nikita Khrushchev's rise to the Soviet leadership, Vasilevsky was removed from his positions in 1957. After his death in 1977, he was buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis in recognition of his past service and contributions to his country.
Vasilevsky was born on September 30, 1895, in Novaya Golchikha in the Kineshma Uyezd (now part of the city of Vichuga, Ivanovo Oblast) in a family of Russian ethnicity. Vasilevsky was the fourth of eight children. His father, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Vasilevsky, was a priest to the nearby St. Nicholas Church. His mother, Nadezhda Ivanovna Sokolova, was the daughter of a priest in the nearby village of Ugletz. Vasilevsky reportedly broke off all contact with his parents after 1926 because of his Communist Party membership and his military duties in the Red Army; three of his brothers did so also. However, the family resumed relations in 1940, following Joseph Stalin's suggestion that they do so.
According to Vasilevsky, his family was extremely poor. His father spent most of his time working to earn money, while the children assisted by working in the fields. In 1897, the family moved to Novopokrovskoe, where his father became a priest to the newly built Ascension Church, and where Aleksandr began his education in the church school. In 1909, he entered Kostroma seminary, which required considerable financial sacrifice on the part of his parents. The same year, a ministerial directive preventing former seminarists from starting university studies initiated a nationwide seminarist movement, with classes stopping in most Russian seminaries. Vasilevsky, among others, was expelled from Kostroma, and only returned several months later, after the seminarists' demands had been satisfied.
After completing his studies in the seminary and spending a few years working as a teacher, Vasilevsky intended to become an agronomist or a surveyor, but the outbreak of the First World War changed his plans. According to his own words, he was "overwhelmed with patriotic feelings" and decided to become a soldier instead. Vasilevsky took his exams 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 agronomist and work in some remote corner of Russia after the war. I could not suppose that my country would change, and I would." After four months of courses that he later considered to be completely outdated, theoretical, and inappropriate for modern warfare, he was sent to the front with the rank of praporshchik, the highest non-commissioned rank in the Russian infantry, in May 1915.
From June to September, Vasilevsky was assigned to a series of reserve regiments, and finally arrived at the front in September as a half-company commander (polurotny) in the 409th Novokhopersky regiment, 109th division, 9th Army. In the spring of 1916, Vasilevsky took command of a company, which eventually became one of the most recognized in the regiment. In May 1916, he led his men during the Brusilov offensive, becoming a battalion commander after heavy casualties among officers, and gaining the rank of captain by age 22.
In November 1917, just after the Russian Revolution, Vasilevsky decided to end his military career. As he wrote in his memoirs, "There was a time when I led soldiers to battle, thinking I was doing my duty as a Russian patriot. However, I understood that we have been cheated, that people needed peace.... Therefore, my military career had to end. With no remorse, I could go back to my favorite occupation, working in the field." He travelled from Romania, where his unit was deployed in 1917, back to his own village.
In December 1917, while back at home, Vasilevsky learned that the men of the 409th regiment, which had been relocated to Ukraine, had elected him as their commander (at the start of the Russian Revolution, commanders were elected by their own men). However, the local military authorities recommended that he decline the proposal because of the heavy fighting taking place in Ukraine between pro-Soviet forces and the pro-independence Ukrainian government (the Central Rada). He followed this advice and became a drill instructor in his own Kineshma uezd. He retired in September 1918 and became a school teacher in the Tula Oblast.
In April 1919, Vasilevsky was again conscripted into the Red Army and sent to command a company fighting against peasant uprisings and assisting in the emergency Soviet policy of prodrazvyorstka, which required peasants to surrender agricultural surplus for a fixed price. Later that year, Vasilevsky took command of a new reserve battalion, and, in October 1919, of a regiment. However, his regiment never took part in the battles of the Russian Civil War, as Anton Denikin's troops never got close to Tula. In December 1919, Vasilevsky was sent to the Western front as a deputy regimental commander, participating in the Polish-Soviet War.
As deputy regimental commander of the 427th regiment, 32nd brigade, 11th division, Vasilevsky participated at the Battle of Berezina, pulling back as the Polish forces had been slowly but steadily advancing eastward, and in the subsequent counterattack that began on May 14, 1920, breaking through Polish lines before being stopped by cavalry counterattacks. Later, starting from July 4, 1920, he took part in the Soviet offensive towards Wilno, advancing to the Neman River despite heavy Polish resistance and German fortifications erected in the region during World War I. Vasilevsky's regiment arrived near Wilno by mid-July and stayed there on garrison duty until the Polish-Soviet War ended with the signing (18 March 1921) of the Treaty of Riga.
After the Treaty of Riga, Vasilevsky fought against remaining White forces and peasant uprisings in Belarus and in the Smolensk Oblast until August 1921. By 1930, he had served as the regimental commander of the 142nd, 143rd, and 144th rifle regiments, where he showed great skill in organizing and training his troops. In 1928, he graduated from the Vystrel regimental commander's course. During these years, Vasilevsky established friendships with higher commanders and Party members, including Kliment Voroshilov, Vladimir Triandafillov and Boris Shaposhnikov. Shaposhnikov, in particular, would become Vasilevsky's protector until the former's death in 1945. Vasilevsky's connections and good performance earned him an appointment to the Directorate of Military Training in 1931.