Russian Holidays - Day of Breaking the Siege of Leningrad

January 18, 1943 became a special date in the history of the USSR On this day, Soviet troops broke the blockade of Leningrad Although the city actually remained under siege for almost another year, this event changed the situation on the Leningrad front and tipped the scales in favor of our troops For the command of the German army, Leningrad was an important strategic object, but the main prerequisite for the start of the blockade of the city on the Neva was the plan to capture Moscow "Barbarossa" involved combat operations in three directions Army Group “North” was supposed to attack Leningrad, the Germans prepared Army Group “South” for Kyiv, and they planned to advance Army Group “Center” to capture Moscow However, German troops first had to capture Kronstadt and Leningrad, and only after that a victorious campaign against the capital of the USSR should have taken place Leningrad was the second most important city in the USSR There were 333 large industrial enterprises operating in the Northern capital, employing more than 500,000 people Almost 25% of all heavy engineering products and slightly more than 30% of electrical engineering products were produced in Leningrad A huge number of factories and local industrial plants and artels operated in the region Almost 75% of the products produced in Leningrad were intended for the defense complex This city was a powerful economic base with enormous scientific and technical potential His capture could influence the course of the war and tip the scales in favor of Germany and its allies On September 6, 1941, Hitler put his signature on a directive according to which Finnish troops, together with Army Group North, were to encircle Soviet troops in the Leningrad area By September 15, they planned to transfer part of their aviation formations and mechanized troops to Army Group Center After the directive was signed, German forces immediately began to carry out the orders of the command Finnish troops blocked the city from the north They were stopped by soldiers of the 23rd Army near the Karelian Ur Two days after the directive was signed, the troops of the North group took control of the Petrokrepost The source of the Neva was in the hands of the Germans, which meant that Leningrad was blocked from land as well It is September 8 that is considered the official date of the beginning of the siege of Leningrad, which as a result lasted 872 days Encircled was most of the Leningrad Fleet, almost the entire Baltic Fleet and the entire civilian population of the city, which was once the Russian capital Approximately 500,000 military and 2,840,000 civilians were completely cut off from the rest of the country The area of ​​the besieged territories together with the suburbs was about 5,000 sq km The siege of Leningrad became a cruel test for both the military and the civilian population They had only one way through which they could maintain contact with the outside world - Ladoga In the warm season, communication was carried out by water, and in the winter - by ice This only path was called the “Road of Life” Evacuees were saved along it, and food, ammunition and medicine were delivered to the besieged city along it From November 1941 to April 1942 alone, almost 500,000 residents were removed from the city and more than 361 tons of cargo were delivered, the lion's share of which was food Unfortunately, this was not enough to save the remaining people from starvation The German troops were well aware of the “Road of Life” and were regularly bombarding it In the fall of 1941, immediately after the siege of the city began, Soviet troops twice tried to restore land communications It all ended with the defense of the “Nevsky Piglet” - a bridgehead only 500-800 meters wide, which they held from 1941 to 1943 (with a short break) Alas, the first attempts at a breakthrough were unsuccessful On February 14, 1944, a full-scale offensive operation by Soviet troops began, which ended with the final breakthrough of the blockade and the complete liberation of the besieged city A year earlier, on January 18, the troops of the Leningrad and Volkhov fronts united and on the same day liberated the Petrokrepost, cleared the entire southern coast of Ladoga from the Germans and restored land communications with the rest of the country, opening a corridor 8-11 km wide