Table of Data Points

The 2nd and 3rd panzer army's largely successful encirclement of the 16th, 19th and the 20th Armies south of Smolensk. 200,000 troops from the 19th managed to escape the pocket, leading Hitler to abandon the encirclement as a tactical goal.

290,000 Soviet troops are captured, 1,500 artillery pieces and 2,500 armoured vehicles are destroyed when German troops from Army Group Center capture Minsk. Hitler is furious when he learns that 250,000 Soviet troops escaped the cauldron.

Over 4.5 million Axis troops, transported by 600,000 motor vehicles and 750,000 horses, invade the USSR along a 2,900 km front. Despite tactical success, this would be the last German offensive across the entire eastern front.

Molotov meets Hitler again asking acceptance to liquidate Finland. Hitler now resists every attempt to expand soviet influence in Europe. He sees Britain as defeated and offers India to the Soviet Union.

The code name for German mobilization for the invasion of the Soviet Union. On this day Hitler ordered Walter Warlimont, Deputy Chief of Alfred Jodl, to determine the positions of Soviet troops in the East.