Vladimir Vasilyevich Kurasov

Vladimir Kurasov

Vladimir Vasilyevich Kurassow ( Russian Владимир Васильевич Курасов * July 7 ^{. Jul} / 19th July  1897 ^greg. In St. Petersburg ; † 29. November 1973 in Moscow ) was a Soviet army general .

Life

He came from a working-class family and after elementary school he completed the last grade of a technical school. In 1913 he worked as an apprentice in an engraving workshop . In September 1915 he volunteered for the Imperial Army . He was initially trained in the reserve battalion of the Semyonovskoye bodyguard regiment. In December 1915 he was platoon leader in the 148th Infantry Regiment in Kuznetsk near Saratov . Since February 1916 he fought on the Western Front as commander of a company of the 530 Infantry Regiment near Smorgon . After the February Revolution of 1917 , the soldiers subordinate to him voted unanimously that he should continue to lead the unit. At the end of 1917 he joined the Red Guard in Petrograd , where he led a company and then a battalion.

Red Army and General Staff training

In December 1918 he joined the Red Army and organized the 622nd Rifle Regiment in Oranienbaum at the beginning of the Russian Civil War . From October 1919 he commanded a division of the Baltic Fleet and fought the white troops of General Nikolai Yudenich . In January 1920 he took over a company of the 1st Guards Rifle Regiment during the 5th Petrograd Command Course and graduated from the Military Pedagogical Institute in Moscow the following year .

Between 1921 and 1929 he attended a number of other higher education courses and acted as a teacher for tactics in Oranienbaum and as a trainer at the International Infantry School in Leningrad. In 1932 he graduated from the Frunze Military Academy and then served in the headquarters of the Belorus Military District. In 1935 he was promoted to colonel and appointed chief of staff of the 16th Rifle Corps in Mogilew .

From 1936 to 1938 he studied at the Academy of the General Staff of the Red Army and, after graduating, was admitted as a lecturer for the training of higher tactical formations. From 1940 he acted as deputy head of the personnel department for operational management in the general staff.

Second World War

At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War , Colonel Kurasov still worked in the higher general staff and was promoted to major general on October 28, 1941 .

In December 1941, under General Andrei Jerjomenko, he was appointed Chief of Staff of the 4th Shock Army on the Northwest and Kalinin Fronts . During the Battle of Cholm from January to February 1942, his troops penetrated almost 300 kilometers deep into the enemy-occupied hinterland.

In March 1942 he himself became the commander of the 4th Shock Army and on May 21 he was promoted to lieutenant general. In April 1943 he was appointed Chief of Staff of the Kalinin Front, which was renamed the 1st Baltic Front in October 1943 . He played a prominent role in the Smolensk , Nevel, and Gorodok operations in the fall of 1943 . In the course of Operation Bagration , his armed forces carried out the successful battles between Vitebsk - Orsha and Polotsk . On 28 June 1944 he was appointed Colonel-General conveyed, and under the command of General Bagramyan he excelled in autumn 1944, again in the Baltic operation from which to retake Riga led.

In January 1945 parts of his front took part in the Battle of East Prussia and carried out successful operations against the German bridgehead Memel . In February 1945 the 1st Baltic Front was disbanded due to the shortening of the front. Colonel-General Kurasov and his entire staff were appointed to lead the Semlander Group and placed under the command of the 3rd Belarusian Front . Kurassow remained chief of staff of this group, which, in cooperation with the Baltic Fleet, fought the German army division Gollnick . A few days before the end of the war, Kurasov was appointed deputy chief of staff, but only remained in this position until June 1945 because he was appointed chief of staff of the Soviet military administration in Germany .

post war period

After the war, he served as Soviet High Commissioner in Austria from 1946 to 1949 and rose to Army General on November 12, 1948.

On April 20, 1949 he was appointed head of the Voroshilov Military Academy (Higher Military Academy of the General Staff). From 1947 to 1951 he was a member of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR , in between he also served as a member of the Moscow City Council. From June 8, 1956, he was deputy head of the general staff and head of the military-scientific department of the general staff. In December 1961 he was reappointed head of the Military Academy of the General Staff and in 1963 received the title of professor. From March 1963 he served as the representative of the Commander-in-Chief of the Warsaw Pact Armed Forces in the National People's Army of the German Democratic Republic . Since April 1968 he served as a military advisor to the group of inspectors in the Ministry of Defense of the USSR.

Vladimir Kurasov was buried in the Novodevichy Cemetery.

Web links

Commons : Vladimir Kurasov  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Biography at «Герои страны»

predecessor	Office	successor
Ivan Stepanowitsch Konew	Soviet High Commissioner in Austria 1946–1949	Vladimir Petrovich Sviridov