{"id":1017,"date":"2025-04-14T12:05:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-14T12:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/beyondbarbarossa.ca\/?p=1017"},"modified":"2026-10-19T19:07:38","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T19:07:38","slug":"red-armys-3rd-crushing-blow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/beyondbarbarossa.ca\/?p=1017","title":{"rendered":"The Third Crushing Blow: Odesa and Crimea offensives, episode 72"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In 1944, the Red Army delivers its third crushing blow on the Axis forces in eastern Europe: two major offensives to recapture the rest of Ukraine, and the Crimean peninsula. <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Map 1: Northern Black Sea coast and southern Ukraine <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
The range where the two mighty blows were delivered. Ploesti, Romania is to the far left of the map, just north of Bucharest.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Map 2: <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Map by Scott Bury<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Map 3: The Red Army\u2019s Crimean offensive, 1944<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"CrimeanOffensive1944.jpg\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Historical photos<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Issa Pliyev, Commander, Cavalry-Mechanized Group<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The Red Army, 4th Guards Cavalry Corps advancing across southern Ukraine, 1944<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Mikl\u00f3s Horthy, Regent of Hungary, with Adolf Hitler in Budapest, 1938<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The Red Army marches into \u201cliberated\u201d Odesa, 1944. Note the women soldiers in the ranks.\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sources<\/strong>:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Prit Buttar, The Reckoning: The Defeat of Army Group South, 1944.<\/em> Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941\u20131945.<\/em> London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin\u2019s War 1941\u20131945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK,<\/em> The History Press, 2017. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wikipedia: The Crimean Offensive https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Crimean_offensive<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014 The Odesa Offensive https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Odessa_Offensive<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1944, the Red Army delivers its third crushing blow on the Axis forces in eastern Europe: two major offensives to recapture the rest of Ukraine, and the Crimean peninsula.  Map 1: Northern Black Sea coast and southern Ukraine  Map 2:  Map 3: The Red Army\u2019s Crimean offensive, 1944 Historical…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1024,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[44],"tags":[324,35,329,331,59,327,159,255,32,322,328,203,31,34,48,43,33,253,30,28,326,65],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-1017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-season-4","tag-dnipro","tag-eastern-front","tag-ferdinand-shorner","tag-general-pliyev","tag-hitler","tag-horthy","tag-hungary","tag-malinovsky","tag-nazi-germany","tag-odessa","tag-operation-margarethe","tag-rasputitsa","tag-second-world-war","tag-soviet-union","tag-stalin","tag-ukraine","tag-ussr","tag-vatutin","tag-world-war-2","tag-world-war-ii","tag-wotan-line","tag-zhukov"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Third Crushing Blow: Odesa and Crimea offensives, episode 72 - 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