📅 #OTD in 1944, units of the Red Army’s 1st, 2nd and 3rd Belarusian fronts, supported by the 1st Baltic Front, liberated Minsk as part of Operation Bagration.

On June 28, 1941, Nazi forces seized the city. The Nazis destroyed nearly 80% of residential buildings, hastened to establish a ghetto. 400,000+ people perished by their hand in Minsk and its outskirts. The crimes committed there have but one word to describe them - genocide.

The retreating invaders took out their anger on the city and its resilient denizens: they blew up 23 major enterprises, wrecked a water conduit, blew up local sewers and the telephone network, destroyed 47 schools, as well as theatres, libraries, outpatient clinics and hospitals.

🔥 At 2:30 am on July 3 the occupiers felt the righteous anger of the Red Army. Eyewitnesses wrote that the Germans began to panic when the Soviet soldiers descended on the city. Partisans helped to liberate the city; they took part in the preparation of the operation plan and participated in street fighting.

The Soviet air force, which dominated the skies, hit the enemy hard,wreaking havoc on the retreating Nazis and hampering the arrival of their reserves

Highly effective and well-coordinated operations made it possible to expel the enemy from Minsk by the evening of July 3. To commemorate this event, Moscow ordered a 324-gun artillery salute.

❗️ It should be noted that Soviet forces continued to mop up the German formation, encircled to the east and southeast of Minsk, in the so-called Minsk pocket, until July 11. The Nazis failed to break out of the pocket. In all, 70,000 enemy soldiers were killed, and around 35,000 more, including 12 generals, were taken prisoner.

The main forces of the three Belarusian fronts pushed westward, while the others continued to mop up the encircled enemy formation near Minsk.

#Victory78