The Great Patriotic War, 1941–1945

The factors that enabled the USSR to secure victory in the Great Patriotic War (1941–45). A brief overview of Soviet foreign policy in the 1920s and 1930s and the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact; Operation Barbarossa; Stalin's leadership including the purging of the Red Army, Orders 270 and 227, the Great Evacuation, Lend-Lease and the use of the Russian Orthodox Church; military engagements such as Stalingrad (Operation Uranus), Kursk and Bagration; the role of military leaders such as Zhukov, Chuikov and Vasilevsky; and the impact of social and political forces including Russian nationalism, the role of women, propaganda, STAVKA and the NKVD.