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Shtrafbats
''Shtrafbats'' (, ) were Soviet penal battalions that fought on the Eastern Front in World War II. The ''shtrafbats'' were greatly increased in number by Joseph Stalin in July 1942 via Order No. 227 (Директива Ставки ВГК №227). Order No. 227 was a desperate effort to re-instill discipline after the panicked routs of the first year of combat with Germany. The order—popularized as the "Not one step back!" (Ни шагу назад!, Ni shagu nazad!) Order—introduced severe punishments, including summary execution, for unauthorized retreats.Tolstoy 1981 In his order, Stalin also mentioned Hitler's successful use of penal battalions (also known as ''Strafbataillon'') as a means to ensure obedience among regular Wehrmacht units. Organization Pursuant to Order No. 227, the first penal battalions were originally authorized a strength of 800 men; penal companies were also authorized, consisting of between 150 and 200 men per company.Suvorov 1982 In addition to ...
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Union Of Soviet Socialist Republics
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until it dissolved in 1991. During its existence, it was the largest country by area, extending across eleven time zones and sharing borders with twelve countries, and the third-most populous country. An overall successor to the Russian Empire, it was nominally organized as a federal union of national republics, the largest and most populous of which was the Russian SFSR. In practice, its government and economy were highly centralized. As a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), it was a flagship communist state. Its capital and largest city was Moscow. The Soviet Union's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917. The new government, led by Vladimir Lenin, established the Russian SFSR, the world's first constitutionally communist state. The revolution was not accepted by all ...
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Private (rank)
A private is a soldier, usually with the lowest Military rank, rank in many armies. Soldiers with the rank of private may be conscription, conscripts or they may be professional (career) soldiers. The term derives from the term "private soldier". "Private" comes from the Latin word ''privus'' or perhaps ''privo'' that meant an individual person and later an individual without an Official (other), office. Asia Indonesia In Indonesia, this rank is referred to as ''Tamtama'' (specifically ''Prajurit'' which means soldier), which is the lowest rank in the Indonesian National Armed Forces. In the Indonesian Army, Indonesian Marine Corps, and Indonesian Air Force, "Private" has three levels, which are: Private (''Prajurit Dua''), Private First Class (''Prajurit Satu''), and Chief Private (''Prajurit Kepala''). After this rank, the next promotion is to Corporal. File:prada pdh ad.png, Private (''Prajurit Dua'') File:pratu pdh ad.png, Private First Class (''Prajurit Satu'') ...
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Turner Publishing Company
Turner Publishing Company is an American independent book publisher based in Nashville, Tennessee. The company is in the top 101 independent publishing companies in the U.S. as compiled by Bookmarket.com, and has been named four times to ''Publishers Weekly''s Fastest Growing Publishers List. History Turner Publishing Company was founded in 1984 in Paducah, Kentucky, as a publisher of books. From 1984 to 2005 the company published specialty and commemorative titles focusing on history. During this period, Turner Publishing Company produced over 500 titles in the categories of military history, local history, and organizational history, including: History of the FDNY (New York City Fire Department) and History of the 101st Airborne Division. In 2002 the company was sold to new management and moved to Nashville, Tennessee. Turner launched its move into trade publishing with a program of regional history titles in 2005. This series of local history photography books, called "His ...
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Russian Penal Military Units
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia has recruited substantial numbers of prisoners into military units. The Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine has claimed that Russia has recruited between 140,000 and 180,000 convicts to fight Ukraine. The Russian paramilitary Wagner Group widely recruited from prisons starting in 2022, growing their forces by an estimated 40,000. According to the New York Times, Wagner's prison recruitment campaign began in early July 2022, when Prigozhin personally appeared in prisons around St. Petersburg and offered deals to the prisoners. However, the Wagner Group lost access to the prisons in February 2023 amidst schisms with the regular Russian Ministry of Defense. The Russian MoD itself reportedly began recruiting prisoners in October 2022. In April 2023, information emerged about the creation of the Storm-Z series of units by the MoD. After receiving only ten to fifteen days of training, these units are attached to regular Russian forc ...
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Strafbattalion
''Strafbataillon'' ( English: "penal battalion") is the generic term for penal units that were created from prisoners during the Second World War in all branches of the ''Wehrmacht''. Soldiers, criminals and civilians sentenced to those units were generally poorly armed and required to undertake dangerous high-casualty missions. The ''Strafbataillon'' were operated and administered by the ''Feldgendarmerie'', the German military police. By 1943, the course of the war had turned against Nazi Germany. Military losses and the need to maintain discipline by example made the German High Command order that further punishment units should be formed from the thousands of ''Wehrmacht'' military prisoners that were held in its military prisons. The ''Strafbataillon'', which were under the control of the ''Feldgendarmerie'', were then used to conduct dangerous operations (sometimes akin to suicide missions) for the '' Heer'', such as clearing minefields, assaulting difficult objectives an ...
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Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People's Commissars to oppose the military forces of the new nation's adversaries during the Russian Civil War, especially the various groups collectively known as the White Army. In February 1946, the Red Army (which embodied the main component of the Soviet Armed Forces alongside the Soviet Navy) was renamed the "Soviet Army". Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union it was split between the post-Soviet states, with its bulk becoming the Russian Ground Forces, commonly considered to be the successor of the Soviet Army. The Red Army provided the largest land warfare, ground force in the Allies of World War II, Allied victory in the European theatre of World War II, and its Soviet invasion of Manchuria, invasion of Manchuria assisted the un ...
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Barrier Troops
Barrier troops, blocking units, or anti-retreat forces are military units that are located in the rear or on the front line (behind the main forces) to maintain military discipline, prevent the flight of servicemen from the battlefield, capture spies, saboteurs and deserters, and return troops who flee from the battlefield or lag behind their units. Barrier troops differ from military police, as barrier troops exert their effect through physical presence near specific allied units, as a preventative measure against retreat and other actions, whereas military police apprehend and control those who have already done so, typically in a wider area. Confederate States Army During the American Civil War, some Confederates were reported to have forced their African American slaves to fire upon Union soldiers while holding them at gunpoint. According to John Parker, a slave who was forced by the Confederates to fight Union soldiers at the First Battle of Bull Run, "Our masters tried all ...
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NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (, ), abbreviated as NKVD (; ), was the interior ministry and secret police of the Soviet Union from 1934 to 1946. The agency was formed to succeed the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) secret police organization, and thus had a monopoly on intelligence and state security functions. The NKVD is known for carrying out political repression and the Great Purge under Joseph Stalin, as well as counterintelligence and other operations on the Eastern Front of World War II. The head of the NKVD was Genrikh Yagoda from 1934 to 1936, Nikolai Yezhov from 1936 to 1938, Lavrentiy Beria from 1938 to 1946, and Sergei Kruglov in 1946. First established in 1917 as the NKVD of the Russian SFSR, the ministry was tasked with regular police work and overseeing the country's prisons and labor camps. It was disbanded in 1930, and its functions dispersed among other agencies before being reinstated as a commissariat of the Soviet Union ...
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SMERSH
SMERSH () was an umbrella organization for three independent counter-intelligence agencies in the Red Army formed in late 1942 or even earlier, but officially announced only on 14 April 1943. The name SMERSH was coined by Joseph Stalin. The formal justification for its creation was to subvert the attempts by Nazi German forces to infiltrate the Red Army on the Eastern Front."The Soviet Army: SMERSH"
SpetsNaz Psychology
The official statute of SMERSH listed the following tasks to be performed by the organisation: counter-intelligence, , preventing any other activity of foreign intelligence in the Red Army; fighting "

Barrier Troops
Barrier troops, blocking units, or anti-retreat forces are military units that are located in the rear or on the front line (behind the main forces) to maintain military discipline, prevent the flight of servicemen from the battlefield, capture spies, saboteurs and deserters, and return troops who flee from the battlefield or lag behind their units. Barrier troops differ from military police, as barrier troops exert their effect through physical presence near specific allied units, as a preventative measure against retreat and other actions, whereas military police apprehend and control those who have already done so, typically in a wider area. Confederate States Army During the American Civil War, some Confederates were reported to have forced their African American slaves to fire upon Union soldiers while holding them at gunpoint. According to John Parker, a slave who was forced by the Confederates to fight Union soldiers at the First Battle of Bull Run, "Our masters tried all ...
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Stalingrad
Volgograd,. geographical renaming, formerly Tsaritsyn. (1589–1925) and Stalingrad. (1925–1961), is the largest city and the administrative centre of Volgograd Oblast, Russia. The city lies on the western bank of the Volga, covering an area of , with a population of slightly over one million residents. Volgograd is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, 16th-largest city by population size in Russia, the third-largest city of the Southern Federal District, and the Volga#Biggest cities on the shores of the Volga, fourth-largest city on the Volga. The city was founded as the fortress of ''Tsaritsyn'' in 1589. By the 19th century, Tsaritsyn had become an important river-port and commercial centre, leading to its rapid population growth. In November 1917, at the start of the Russian Civil War, Tsaritsyn came under Bolshevik control. It fell briefly to the White Army in mid-1919 but Battle of Tsaritsyn, returned to Bolshevik control in January 1920. In 1925, the city ...
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Alexander Gorbatov
Alexander Vasilyevich Gorbatov (; 21 March 1891 – 7 December 1973) was a Russian and Soviet officer who served as an officer in the Imperial Russian Army during the First World War and as a colonel-general in the Red Army during the Second World War, and was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Following the war, Gorbatov served as a Soviet commandant in Soviet-occupied Germany and East Germany and ultimately retired as a four-star general at the rank of General of the Army. His acclaimed autobiography, entitled "''Years off My Life''" was published in 1964. First World War and aftermath Alexander Gorbatov served in the Imperial Russian Army during the course of the First World War, fighting in numerous engagements along the Eastern Front, including the Battles of Tannenburg, Galicia (Central Europe), Galicia, Przemyśl, the Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive, both Battles of the Masurian Lakes, the Brusilov offensive, and the Kerensky offensive.Erickson John (1984). The ...
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