Vasilevsky, Alexander M (1895–1977) San Francisco Conference and supported most of President Harry Truman’s early Cold War policy initiatives VARSITY (MARCH 23, 1945) See airborne; Germany, conquest of VASILEVSKY, ALEXANDER M (1895–1977) Marshal of the Soviet Union He served in the Tsarist Army during World War II before joining the Red Army in 1919 to fight for the “Reds” in the Russian Civil War (1918–1921) He rose to a General Staff position in 1937, an association he would retain for most of the war He was appointed chief of operations in the aftermath of hard Soviet reverses in 1941 In June 1942, he was elevated to chief of the General Staff He was the main planner of the spectacular Red Army counteroffensive at Stalingrad that broke through weaker Axis armies on either flank of that besieged city and enveloped the enemy within it In addition to serving as master planner, Vasilevsky acted as a roving Stavka representative to various Fronts during successive operations from the Crimea, to Ukraine, to Belorussia In February 1945, he was replaced as chief of the General Staff by Alexei Antonov, but remained on the Stavka He took command of 3rd Belorussian Front during the invasion of Germany in 1945 He was master planner and commander in chief of the massive Soviet assault on Japanese forces in Manchuria in August After the war he again served as chief of the General Staff See also Smolensk VATICAN See concordats; Eichmann, Adolf; Italian campaign (1943–1945); Pius XI; Pius XII; ratlines; Mussolini, Benito VATUTIN, NIKOLAI F (1901–1944) Soviet general Too young to fight in World War I, he first saw action fighting for the Reds at age nineteen during the Russian Civil War (1918–1921) He studied at advanced military academies in the 1920s and 1930s and was appointed deputy to the General Staff He made his mark as a field commander with the Voronezh and Southwestern Fronts (later renamed 1st Ukrainian Front) in 1942–1944, fighting outside Stalingrad, at Kursk, and especially in a brilliant secret maneuver that led to a breakthrough in the south and swift recapture of Kiev during the Second Battle of Ukraine in November 1943 He was criticized for his follow-through after Kiev, but along with General Ivan S Konev achieved an encirclement of German 8th Army that cleared the Wehrmacht from southwestern Ukraine On February 29, 1944, Vatutin was severely wounded near Rovno in an ambush by several hundred nationalist guerillas of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) He lingered for two months after his leg was amputated, before dying on April 15 He is widely regarded as among the outstanding Soviet operational planners, as well as field commanders, of the war See also Demiansk offensive operation 1134