Rokossovsky briefly about the military leader
Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky short biography for children
Konstantin Konstantinovich (Ksaverevich) Rokossovsky - briefly about the famous military leader, Marshal of the USSR and Poland.
Rokossovsky lived a surprisingly adventurous life. Even his biography is so complicated that it is not so easy to understand all the facts of his life. The future marshal was born in 1896.
Speaking briefly about Rokossovsky, it should be noted that there is some confusion with the marshal’s birthplace. He was born in Warsaw, although his official biography indicates a different place - the city of Velikiye Luki.
The father belonged to a noble Polish family. Rokossovsky was orphaned very early. First the father died, a few years later the mother died. To survive, I had to work from an early age.
When the First World War began, he went to the front, adding an extra two years to himself so that he would definitely be accepted into the army. Having started his service as a private, Rokossovsky showed himself to be such an excellent soldier that for his services he quickly received the rank of junior non-commissioned officer.
Rokossovsky accepted the October Revolution and its ideas because they were close and understandable to him. He voluntarily joins the Red Guard and participates in suppressing uprisings against Soviet power.
During the Civil War, he first became the commander of a squadron, and then a regiment.
In 1935, when the system of military ranks was introduced in the USSR, Rokossovsky became division commander.
In the years Stalin's repressions was accused of having connections with Japanese and Polish intelligence, was arrested and was under investigation for two years. Rokossovsky stubbornly denied his guilt, knowing that the accusation was based on false testimony. In 1940 he was completely acquitted and reinstated in the party and rank. In the same year, having received the rank of major general, he came under the command of Zhukov.
When the Great Patriotic War began, Rokossovsky had to learn the art of military leadership in the harshest conditions - it was his 16th Army that defended the approaches to Moscow in the Volokolamsk direction from enemies. During the war years, he had to take part in the most famous battles - near Moscow, Stalingrad, on the Kursk Bulge. For the “Bagration” operation developed and brilliantly implemented jointly with Zhukov, Rokossovsky received the rank of marshal.
1949 is the time of returning home. Rokossovsky was asked to become Poland's defense minister. Since 1956 - deputy. Minister of Defense of the USSR.
Having lived to a ripe old age, twice Hero of the USSR, Marshal Rokossovsky died in 1968, at the age of 71.
Unknown exact date birth of Konstantin Konstantinovich. According to some sources, he was born in 1896, others - in 1894.
As for the family of the future marshal, there is also very little information about it. It is known that his ancestors belonged to the small village of Rokossovo, which is located on the territory of modern Poland. It is from its name that the commander’s surname comes from.
Konstantin Konstantinovich's great-grandfather's name was Yuzef. He was also a military man and devoted his entire life to service. Rokossovsky's father served on the railroad, and Antonina's mother was from Belarus and worked as a school teacher.
At the age of six, young Kostya was sent to a technical school. However, after the death of his father in 1902, he had to give up his studies, since his mother could not pay for it on her own. The boy tried to help his family as best he could, working as an apprentice for a stonecutter, a pastry chef, and even a doctor. He loved to read and learn new things.
In 1914 he joined the dragoon regiment. There he learned to master horses, shoot weapons, and fight superbly with pikes and checkers. In the same year, for military successes, Rokossovsky received the St. George Cross of the fourth degree and was promoted to corporal.
In 1923, he married Yulia Barmina, and two years later their daughter Ariadne was born.
Rokossovsky's military career
At the end of March 1917, Rokossovsky was promoted to junior non-commissioned officers. In October 1917, he made an important decision in his life, joining the Red Army. For two years he fought against the enemies of the revolution. He was very courageous and quickly knew how to make the right decisions in difficult military situations. As a result, his career rapidly took off. In 1919, he became the commander of a squadron, and a year later - a cavalry regiment.
In 1924, Konstantin Konstantinovich was sent to courses to improve commander qualities. There he met such famous military leaders as Georgy Zhukov and Andrei Eremenko.
Then, for three years, Rokossovsky passed military service in Mongolia.
In 1929, he took advanced training courses for senior command personnel, where he met Mikhail Tukhachevsky. In 1935, Rokossovsky received the personal rank of division commander.
However, after a series of career ups, Rokossovsky hit a “dark streak” in his life. Because of denunciations, Konstantin Konstantinovich was first deprived of all his well-deserved titles, and then dismissed from the army and arrested. The investigation lasted three years and ended in 1940. All charges against Rokossovsky were dropped, his ranks were returned and he was even promoted to major general.
In 1941, Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the Fourth and then the Sixteenth armies. For special services to the Fatherland, he was awarded the rank of lieutenant general. For personal services in the battles near Moscow, Rokossovsky was awarded the Order of Lenin.
During the Great Patriotic War, Konstantin Konstantinovich was seriously wounded. The shrapnel hit vital organs - the lung and liver, as well as damaged the ribs and spine.
The most important event in Rokossovsky's military career was Battle of Stalingrad. As a result of a brilliantly developed operation, the city was liberated, and almost one hundred thousand German soldiers led by Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus were captured.
In 1943, Rokossovsky was appointed head of the Central Front. Its main task was to push back the enemy on the Kursk-Oryol arc. The enemy resisted fiercely and there were fierce battles.
At the Kursk Bulge, methods of warfare that were completely new for that time were tested, such as defense in depth, artillery counter-training and others. As a result, the enemy was defeated, and Rokossovsky was awarded the rank of army general.
Konstantin Konstantinovich himself considered the liberation of Belarus in 1944 his main victory.
After the end of the war, Rokossovsky was awarded the second Order of the Golden Star. It was he who hosted the parade on Red Square in 1946. Being a Pole by origin, he moved to Poland in 1949 and did a lot there to strengthen the country's defense capability.
In 1956, Rokossovsky returned to the USSR. Over the years he was Minister of Defense and headed various state commissions. Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky died on August 3, 1968. His ashes are in the Kremlin wall.
Born on December 21, 1896 in the small Russian town of Velikiye Luki (formerly Pskov province), in the family of a Pole railway driver, Xavier-Józef Rokossovsky, and his Russian wife Antonina.
After the birth of Konstantin, the Rokossovsky family moved to Warsaw. At less than 6 years old, Kostya was orphaned: his father was in a train accident and died in 1902 after a long illness. In 1911, his mother also died.
With the outbreak of World War I, Rokossovsky asked to join one of the Russian regiments heading west through Warsaw. He was readily accepted. He was 18 years old. Konstantin Rokossovsky became an ordinary Russian fighter tsarist army. Soon he was promoted to junior non-commissioned officer of the Kargopol Dragoon Regiment. Here he served from August to October 1917.
After the October armed uprising, he served in the Red Army as an assistant detachment chief, commander of a cavalry squadron and a separate cavalry division. For the battle against Kolchak he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner. Then Rokossovsky commanded cavalry regiments, brigades, divisions, and corps. On the Eastern Front he took part in battles against the White Czechs, Admiral Kolchak, Semenov's gangs, and Baron Ungern. For the last operation he was awarded the second Order of the Red Banner.
After two years of studying at the Higher Cavalry Command Courses, K.K. Rokossovsky served as an instructor for the cavalry division, which was then being created in the Mongolian people's army. In 1929 he fought on the Chinese Eastern Railway.
In August 1937, he became a victim of slander: he was arrested and accused of having connections with foreign intelligence services. He behaved courageously, did not admit guilt to anything, and in March 1940 he was released and fully restored to civil rights.
From July to November 1940, K.K. Rokossovsky commanded the cavalry, and from the beginning of the Great Patriotic War - the 9th mechanized corps. In July 1941, he was appointed commander of the 4th Army and transferred to the Western Front (Smolensk direction). The Yartsevo group of troops, led by Rokossovsky, stops the powerful pressure of the Nazis.
During the German offensive on Moscow, Rokossovsky commanded the troops of the 16th Army and led the defense of the Yakhroma, Solnechnogorsk and Volokolamsk directions. In the decisive days of the battle for the capital, he organizes a successful counter-offensive of the troops of the 16th Army in the Solnechnogorsk and Istra directions. During the bold operation, enemy strike forces trying to bypass Moscow from the north and south were defeated. The enemy was driven back 100–250 km from Moscow. The Wehrmacht suffered its first major defeat in the war, and the myth of its invincibility was dispelled.
The commander of the troops of the Western Front, G.K. Zhukov, wrote in his combat description: “Comrade. Rokossovsky successfully carried out a defensive operation by the troops of the 16th Army and did not allow the enemy to reach Moscow. He also skillfully carried out an offensive operation to defeat the German troops. Well prepared operationally and tactically, personally courageous, proactive and energetic. The army troops are firmly controlled. There were cases of superficial attitude in the organization of the operation and battle, as a result of which parts of the army suffered losses without achieving success. The position of commander of army troops is quite appropriate.”
This is a curious fact. In the first months of the war, the country, reading the reports of the Sovinformburo, did not know what kind of secret commander was hiding under the letter R. Especially often this “commander R.” was called in the days of the heroic defense of Moscow. Only on October 20, 1941, an official statement stated that “the soldiers of commander Comrade. Rokossovsky, repelling the fierce attacks of the Germans, burned 60 tanks...” And the next day: “On October 21, the units of commander Rokossovsky repelled the incessant attacks of the enemy and struck him themselves.”
In July 1942, during the German breakthrough to Voronezh, K.K. Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the Bryansk Front. In those days, the enemy managed to reach the great bend of the Don and create a direct threat to Stalingrad and North Caucasus. The front troops covered the Tula direction with their right wing, and the Voronezh direction with their left, with the task of holding the occupied line (northwest of Voronezh) and stopping the enemy’s advance into the interior of the country. With a counterattack from the front forces, Rokossovsky thwarted the Germans’ attempt to expand the breakthrough to the north towards Yelets.
The counteroffensive near Stalingrad began with the forces of the Southwestern (under the command of N.F. Vatutin) and the Don Fronts (under the command of K.K. Rokossovsky) on November 19, 1942, with the forces of the Stalingrad Front (under the command of A.I. Eremenko) - on November 20. The task of the Southwestern and Stalingrad fronts was to encircle and destroy the entire fascist group of troops in the Stalingrad direction by connecting troops of both fronts in the area of the city of Kalach. The troops of the Don Front of K.K. Rokossovsky had the goal of encircling, together with part of the forces of the Stalingrad Front, the fascist group in Stalingrad itself and on the near approaches to it.
In 1943, the Central Front, led by Rokossovsky, first successfully carried out a defensive battle on the Kursk Bulge, and then, having organized a counteroffensive west of Kursk, defeated fascist troops here, liberated from the invaders the entire territory east of the Sozh and Dnieper rivers from Gomel to Kyiv, capturing a number of bridgeheads on western bank of the Dnieper.
At the end of 1943 and in January 1944, commanding the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front, K.K. Rokossovsky led the offensive operations of the front troops on the territory of Belarus. As a result of these operations, a wide bridgehead was conquered west of the Dnieper River, the cities of Mozyr, Kalinkovichi, Rechitsa, Gomel were liberated, bridgeheads were captured on the western bank of the Dnieper to the Drut River north of Rogachev and on the Berezina River south of Rogachev. This made it possible to begin preparations for the Bobruisk-Minsk operation.
On June 23, Rokossovsky, according to the Headquarters plan, began the Belarusian strategic operation “Bagration” (06.23-08.29). It was one of the largest operations of the Second World War. As a result of the decisive actions of the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front, with the assistance of the 2nd and 3rd Belorussian Fronts, one of the most powerful enemy groups - Army Group Center - was defeated. During the first five days of hostilities, front troops broke through enemy defenses in a 200-kilometer area and advanced to a depth of more than 100 km. 17 enemy divisions and 3 brigades were completely destroyed, 50 divisions lost more than half of their strength. Having deeply enveloped the German 4th Army from the south, the front troops reached lines favorable for a rush to Minsk and the development of an offensive against Baranovichi. For carrying out this very complex and talentedly carried out strategic operation, K. K. Rokossovsky was awarded the title of Marshal of the Soviet Union.
The continuation of the strategic operation of 1944 was the Minsk offensive operation (June 29 - July 4). It began without a pause and in the absence of a previously prepared defense by the enemy. By the end of July 3, the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front reached the southeastern outskirts of Minsk, where they united with units of the 3rd Belorussian Front, thereby completing the encirclement of the main forces of the 4th and separate formations of the 9th German armies. The successful actions of the Belarusian fronts were assisted by units of the 1st Baltic Front. The task of the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command - encircling the enemy's Minsk group and capturing Minsk - was completed ahead of schedule. The liquidation of the encircled enemy group was carried out on July 5–11.
Developing an offensive west from Minsk, the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front captured Brest at the end of July, liberated the southwestern regions of Belarus, the eastern regions of Poland and captured important bridgeheads on the Vistula - north and south of Warsaw. And again the award - on July 29, K. K. Rokossovsky was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
The fourth summer of the war was coming to an end. The troops of the 1st Belorussian Front reached the banks of the Vistula and encircled Warsaw on both sides. Rokossovsky's separation from this city lasted exactly 30 years. There was not a day when he did not remember the city of his childhood and youth. In addition, his sister Helena (Elena Konstantinovna) lived there all these years. And now, only through binoculars, he sees Warsaw covered in smoke and blazing with fire. There, on the orders of the emigrant government of Mikolajczyk, secretly from the Soviet government and the command of the Red Army, an uprising was launched against the Nazis. Rokossovsky's heart was torn from conflicting feelings: pity, anger and helplessness. After all, the most difficult Belarusian offensive operation has just ended. During it, the troops fought 600 km to the west. Communications have become stretched and logistics supplies have fallen behind. People and equipment are exhausted. Divisions have been drained of blood. With their last breath they reached Prague, a suburb of Warsaw. And at this point they are forced to stop, since all the bridges across the Vistula are blown up, and behind it there is a strong enemy entrenched. Rokossovsky understood that in such extremely advantageous conditions it was impossible to storm Warsaw. We need to tighten up the rear, bring in ammunition, fuel, food, get new equipment and repair equipment damaged in the last battles. All this will take time, but then there’s an uprising...
In moments of Konstantin Konstantinovich’s heavy thoughts about the fate of the residents of Warsaw, a call rang on the HF at night.
What about Warsaw? - asked Stalin. Rokossovsky reported the situation in detail.
Are the front forces now able to undertake an operation to liberate Warsaw? - Stalin asked again.
Rokossovsky knew that such an offensive was impossible, it would only lead to huge additional casualties and would give nothing to the Warsaw people. After a painful pause, the front commander with difficulty informed the Supreme Commander:
Unfortunately, it is impossible to undertake an operation to liberate Warsaw now.
But do everything to ease the situation of the rebels.
I'm doing my best!
And Rokossovsky did everything in his power, honestly and nobly. Po-2 night bombers continuously dropped weapons, ammunition, food, and medicine from low altitude. In two weeks, 5 thousand sorties were flown. The artillerymen conducted targeted fire at enemy positions day and night. Soviet planes, covering considerable distances (nearby airfields were not yet ready), bombed Nazi troops, and fighter planes destroyed fascist aircraft.
Active fighting around Warsaw gradually ceased, and our attacks on a small bridgehead held by the enemy on the eastern bank of the Vistula, in the direction of the strong fortified fortress of Modlin, also subsided. Headquarters ordered the preparation of a new offensive operation. In mid-November the HF call came again.
Stalin was on the phone again.
Comrade Rokossovsky, you are appointed commander of the Second Belorussian Front.
What he heard was so unexpected that Rokossovsky was dumbfounded. What happened? Why, already at the last stage of the war, when all thoughts and desires are directed towards Berlin, is he given such an appointment?
He said frankly, without diplomacy:
Why such disfavor, Comrade Stalin? Why am I being transferred from the main direction to a secondary area?
The question was direct. The prolonged pause indicated that Stalin could not or did not want to answer him with the same frankness. Rokossovsky was waiting. The hand holding the telephone receiver turned white from tension. After a long silence, as if not having heard Rokossovsky’s question, Stalin said:
Zhukov is appointed commander of the First Belorussian Front. How do you look at this?
What could he answer to the Supreme? Zhukov is a talented commander, he can handle any post in the Armed Forces, he can handle any combat mission. He - there is no doubt - will lead Soviet troops to Berlin. But Stalin himself knows all this. He simply said:
A worthy candidate.
Every knowledgeable of principles, which guided Stalin in managing the army and the country, will understand how much this permission meant. Stalin sharply reprimanded those workers who were dragging a whole tail of former employees with them to a new place.
Rokossovsky thought for a minute. Who should I take? He would like to take everyone: members of the Military Council, commanders of military branches, army commanders, all officers, all frontline soldiers.
But he said dryly, based on the interests of the matter:
Comrade Stalin, I won’t take anyone. We have good people everywhere.
This is what I thank you for.
The victorious year of 1945 has arrived. Commanding the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front, Rokossovsky carried out three main offensive operations:
The first is the East Prussian operation. As a result, the entire East Prussian enemy group was defeated and surrounded.
The second is the Pomeranian operation. Its result was the destruction of the East Pomeranian group of German troops and the liberation of the large port cities of Gdynia and Danzig.
The third is the Oder operation, with a breakthrough of the German defenses on the Oder River. As a result of the rapid offensive, the Stettin group of German troops was defeated, and a meeting between the front forces and the Allied troops took place.
Shortly after the end of the Great Patriotic War, on June 24, 1945, the Victory Parade took place on Red Square in Moscow. The honor of hosting the parade was entrusted to Marshal G.K. Zhukov, and the command was entrusted to Marshal K.K. Rokossovsky.
And both of them - the commander and the host of the parade, two outstanding Soviet commanders - proudly gallop on beautiful horses along the front of the troops frozen in holy silence, greeting the glorious victors of the defunct war...
First post-war years(1945–1949) K.K. Rokossovsky was the commander-in-chief of the Northern Group of Soviet troops stationed in Poland. In October 1949, at the request of the Polish government and with the permission of the Soviet government, Rokossovsky was appointed Minister of National Defense and Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the People's Republic of Poland. He was awarded the title of Marshal of Poland.
Upon returning to the USSR in 1956, Rokossovsky held the position of Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, and since July 1957 he has been the chief inspector - deputy minister of defense. Since October 1957 - Commander of the Transcaucasian Military District. In 1958-1962 - Deputy Minister and Chief Inspector of the USSR Ministry of Defense. Since April 1962 - in the Group of Inspectors General.
The marshal of two countries and peoples - Soviet and Polish - deserved many kind words, reviews and characteristics. But G.K. Zhukov said more precisely than anyone else: “Rokossovsky was a very good boss... I’m not even talking about his rare spiritual qualities - they are known to everyone who served at least a little under his command... More thorough, efficient, hardworking and By and large, it’s hard for me to remember a gifted person. Konstantin Konstantinovich loved life, loved people.”
Let us add: people loved him and were proud that they served and fought under the command of this highly respected man. He himself loved his soldiers very much.
“The battles were very difficult, people fought heroically,” he wrote many years later, remembering the war. “Persistence, mutual assistance and a passionate desire to win helped them... Every second they were threatened with death, but people understood their soldier’s duty... Duty was above all for them.”
And for the commander too. He will call his book “A Soldier’s Duty,” which he worked on until his very last breath: the publishers brought an advance copy to the hospital. After leafing through the book, he title page last time signed: “Rokossovsky.”
For military exploits accomplished during the Civil and Great Patriotic Wars, K. K. Rokossovsky was twice awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union and awarded the Order of Victory, seven Orders of Lenin, six Orders of the Red Banner, the Order of Suvorov I degree and Kutuzov I degree, and also many medals. He was awarded a number of foreign awards: Poland - the Order of Virtuti Military, 1st class with a star and the Grunwald Cross, 1st class, France - the Order of the Legion of Honor and the Military Cross, Great Britain - the Knight's Commander's Cross of the Order of the Bath; Mongolia - Order of the Red Banner.
Wounded three times: twice - during the Civil War and during the Great Patriotic War - one seriously.
Konstantin Konstantinovich died on August 3, 1968 at the age of 72. The urn with his ashes was buried on Red Square in the Kremlin wall.
Rokossovsky Konstantin Konstantinovich - not just great commander Russia. This is the one to whom we owe our present. During his life, he managed not only to raise the future generation of excellent generals and commanders, but also to make us respect our country for several centuries to come.
We figure out exactly how he managed to achieve such heights and know the whole truth about his exploits and achievements. And believe me, he has a lot of them.
The childhood of the future commander
Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky was born in Warsaw on December 21, 1896. His father was a Pole, Ksawery Yuzefovich Rokossovsky, an inspector of the Warsaw Railway, and his mother was a Russian teacher, Antonina Ovsyannikova. When little Rokossovsky was only 9 years old, his father died, and the family was left without funds.
After graduating from a four-year school, Konstantin went to work at a hosiery factory. In 1911, Rokossovsky’s mother also died. 14-year-old Kostya and his younger sister are left alone... At that time, Konstantin had already worked as an assistant to a pastry chef, a dentist, and in 1909-1914 as a stonemason in the workshop of Stefan Vysotsky.
For self-education, Rokossovsky read many books in Russian and Polish languages. When World War I began, 18-year-old Konstantin volunteered to join the Kargopol Dragoon Regiment. Just a few days after the start of his service, Rokossovsky distinguished himself while conducting mounted reconnaissance near the village of Yastrzhem, for which he was awarded the St. George Cross of the 4th degree and promoted to corporal. Over the next three years of service, Konstantin rose to the rank of non-commissioned officer and was awarded three St. George medals.
At the age of 23 he joined the Bolshevik Party. The future Marshal of the Soviet Army was distinguished by courage, bravery, honesty and modesty. However, despite his excellent credentials, his promotions were slow during this time due to his Polish origins.
At the beginning of April 1915, the division was transferred to Lithuania. In the battle near the city of Ponevezh, Rokossovsky attacked a German artillery battery, for which he was nominated for the St. George Cross, 3rd degree, but did not receive the award. In the battle for the Troskuny railway station, together with several dragoons, he secretly captured a German field guard trench, and on July 20 he was awarded the St. George Medal, 4th degree.
The Kargopol regiment waged trench warfare on the banks of the Western Dvina. In the winter and spring of 1916, as part of a partisan detachment formed from dragoons, Konstantin crossed the river many times for reconnaissance purposes. On May 6, he received the 3rd degree St. George Medal for attacking a German outpost. In the detachment he met non-commissioned officer Adolf Yushkevich, who had revolutionary views. In June he returned to the regiment, where he again crossed the river on a reconnaissance search.
Pay attention, friends, how different the life of a teenager at the beginning of the last century was from the life of the same teenager of ours. The 20th century is a century of wars and destruction. I remember being a boy, playing war games with guys on the street and all sorts of Cossack robbers. Here the boys are not engaged in games at all. They're running full-scale fighting, take part in battles and reconnaissance operations. Judging by the success of the operations in which young Rokossovsky took part, he simply had to become one of the most outstanding commanders of the Great Patriotic War. But first things first…
Civil War
During the Civil War, Rokossovsky Konstantin Konstantinovich was the commander of a squadron, a separate division, a separate cavalry regiment. On November 7, 1919, south of Mangut station, in a fight with the deputy chief of the 15th Omsk Siberian Rifle Division of Kolchak's army, Colonel Nikolai Voznesensky, he hacked the latter to death, and he himself was wounded in the shoulder.
From the memoirs of Rokossovsky himself:
“...On November 7, 1919, we raided the rear of the White Guards. A separate Ural cavalry division, which I then commanded, broke through the battle formations of Kolchak’s troops at night, obtained information that the headquarters of the Omsk group was located in the village of Karaulnaya, entered from the rear, attacked the village and, crushing the white units, defeated this headquarters, captured prisoners, including including many officers. During an attack during a single combat with the commander of the Omsk group, General Voskresensky (although the correct rank and surname is Colonel Voznesensky), I received a bullet in the shoulder from him, and he received a fatal blow from me with a saber ... "
In the summer of 1921, commanding the Red 35th Cavalry Regiment in the battle near Troitskosavsk, he defeated the 2nd Brigade of General Boris Petrovich Rezukhin from the Asian Cavalry Division of General Baron R. F. von Ungern-Sternberg and was seriously wounded. For this battle, Rokossovsky was awarded the Order of the Red Banner.
On June 9, 1924, during a military operation against the detachments of Mylnikov and Derevtsov, Rokossovsky led one of the Red Army detachments walking along a narrow taiga path.
“... Rokossovsky, who was walking ahead, came across Mylnikov and fired two shots at him from a Mauser. Mylnikov fell. Rokossovsky assumes that Mylnikov was wounded, but due to the impassable taiga, he apparently crawled under a bush and could not be found..."
Mylnikov survived. Soon the Reds quickly established the whereabouts of the wounded General Mylnikov in the house of one of the local residents and arrested him on June 27, 1924. The detachments of Mylnikov and Derevtsov were defeated in one day.
The certification of Konstantin Konstantinovich stated the following:
“He has a strong will, energetic, decisive. Possesses dashing, composure. Aged. Capable of taking useful initiative. He understands the situation well. Smart. In relation to his subordinates, as well as to himself, he is demanding. He loves military affairs... He was awarded two Orders of the Red Banner for operations on the Eastern Front against Kolchak and Ungern. Tasks organizational nature performed carefully. Due to his lack of special military education, it is advisable to send him to courses. The position of the regiment commander is quite appropriate.”
Interwar period
On April 30, 1923, Rokossovsky married Yulia Petrovna Barmina. On June 17, 1925, their daughter Ariadne was born. During these same years, due to the constant distortion of the patronymic name, Ksaverevich Konstantin Rokossovsky began to be called Konstantin Konstantinovich. 
From September 1924, over the next 11 months, Rokossovsky was engaged in his own development in his favorite element - military affairs. He becomes a student of the Cavalry Command Improvement Courses, and goes through them together with G.K. Zhukov and other famous contemporaries.
But that's not all. A few years later, he takes advanced training courses for senior management at the Academy. M. V. Frunze, where he manages to get acquainted with the works of M. N. Tukhachevsky. With the introduction of personal ranks in the Red Army in 1935, he received the rank of division commander. Thus, Rokossovsky already has several thousand people under his command.
How did he manage to earn such a high military position and such a high level of respect in such a short time? I believe that this is due to the fact that Konstantin Konstantinovich understood from childhood: military affairs is the area where he is most useful to society and can succeed. And here is confirmation of my words:
"From the early childhood“,” recalled Konstantin Konstantinovich, “I was fascinated by books about war, military campaigns, battles, bold cavalry attacks... My dream was to experience everything that was said in the books myself.”
However, not the most pleasant event in the life of the great commander soon occurs. In August 1937, Rokossovsky was arrested, unjustly accused of having connections with Polish and Japanese intelligence, convicted, but in March 1940, at the request of his former commander, he was released and returned to the troops. Rokossovsky met the Great Patriotic War in the Kiev Special Military District as the commander of the 9th Mechanized Corps with the rank of Major General.
The Great Patriotic War
On the morning of June 22, 1941, Rokossovsky raised his corps on combat alert, which made a multi-kilometer march and immediately entered the battle. I.Kh., who was then the head of the operations department of the headquarters of the Southwestern Front, recalled how timely and the only correct actions of Rokossovsky were. Baghramyan:
“The third day of the war was coming to an end. An increasingly alarming situation was developing on the Southwestern Front. The threat, in particular, loomed over Lutsk, where the 15th mechanized corps of General I.I. Carpezo needed urgent support, otherwise the enemy tank wedges could cut and crush him. Units of the 87th and 124th rifle divisions, surrounded by the enemy near Lutsk, were also waiting for help. And when we at the front headquarters were racking our brains on how to help out the Lutsk group, the main forces of the 131st motorized and forward detachments tank divisions of the 9th mechanized corps, commanded by K.K. Rokossovsky. Reading his report about this, we literally could not believe our eyes. How did Konstantin Konstantinovich manage to do this? After all, his so-called motorized division could only follow... on foot. It turns out that on the very first day of the war, the decisive and proactive corps commander, at his own peril and risk, took all the vehicles from the district reserve in Shepetovka - and there were about two hundred of them - put the infantry on them and moved them in a combined march in front of the corps. The approach of his units to the Lutsk area saved the situation. They stopped the enemy tanks that had broken through and provided significant assistance to the formations retreating in difficult situations.”
The 9th Mechanized Corps under the command of Rokossovsky took part in the 1941 tank battle near Dubno, Lutsk and Rivne. The actions of the Soviet tank crews did not allow the enemy to encircle the Red Army troops in the Lvov ledge. For military operations at the beginning of the war, Rokossovsky was awarded the fourth Order of the Red Banner. 
CM. Shtemenko, Army General:
“The military leader Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky is very colorful. He had a very difficult role in the famous Battle of Smolensk in 1941 and in defensive battles on the near approaches to Moscow... Konstantin Konstantinovich’s personal charm is irresistible... He was not only endlessly respected, but also sincerely loved by everyone who happened to come into contact with him in his service.”
At the height of the fighting, Rokossovsky was summoned to Moscow, where he received a new assignment - to the Western Front. Front commander Marshal S.K. Tymoshenko, who not long ago rescued Konstantin Konstantinovich from arrest, assigning Rokossovsky a combat mission, warned that the divisions intended for him had not yet arrived, so he ordered to subjugate any units and formations to organize counteraction to the enemy in the Yartsevo area near Smolensk. So, right during the battles, the formation of a formation began, which in headquarters documents was called the group of General Rokossovsky.
“Having learned that in the Yartsevo area and along the eastern bank of the Vop River there were units resisting the Germans, people themselves reached out to us...” Rokossovsky recalled. - It seems important to me to testify to this as an eyewitness and participant in the events. Many units experienced difficult days. Dismembered by enemy tanks and aircraft, they were deprived of a single leadership. And yet, the warriors of these units stubbornly sought an opportunity to unite. They wanted to fight. This is what allowed us to succeed in our organizational efforts to put together a mobile group.”
The successful actions of the “Rokossovsky group” contributed to thwarting the enemy’s attempts to encircle and destroy the troops of the Western Front near Smolensk. After the Battle of Smolensk, Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the 16th Army, which especially distinguished itself in the Battle of Moscow. During the critical days of the defense of Moscow, its troops found themselves in the direction of the main attack of the German troops, defending the northwestern approaches to the capital, and did everything to stop the enemy.
Konstantin Konstantinovich constantly set an example for his subordinates of cheerfulness, energy, and innovation in solving operational and tactical problems. The Battle of Stalingrad On March 8, 1942, Rokossovsky was wounded by a shell fragment. The wound turned out to be serious - the lung and liver were affected. He was taken to the Moscow hospital for senior command personnel, where he was treated until May 23, 1942. On May 26 he arrived in Sukhinichi and again took command of the 16th Army. On September 30, 1942, Lieutenant General Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the Stalingrad Front.
With his participation, a plan was developed Operation Uranus to destroy and encircle the enemy group advancing on Stalingrad. On November 19, 1942, the operation began with the forces of several fronts, and on November 23, the ring around the 6th Army of General F. Paulus was closed. The high command entrusted the leadership of the defeat of the enemy group to K.K. Rokossovsky, which was a sign of respect for him.
After this, Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky captured Field Marshal F. von Paulus, as well as 24 generals, 2,500 German officers and 90 thousand soldiers. On January 28, Rokossovsky was awarded the newly established Order of Suvorov.
Battle of Kursk
In February 1943, Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the Central Front, which was destined for a decisive role in the summer campaign of the same year near Kursk. It was clear from intelligence reports that the Germans were planning a major offensive in the Kursk area in the summer. The commanders of some fronts proposed building on the successes of Stalingrad and launching a large-scale offensive in the summer.
But Rokossovsky had a different opinion. He believed that an offensive required double or triple superiority of forces, which the Soviet troops did not have in this direction. To stop the German offensive near Kursk, it is necessary to go on the defensive. It is necessary to literally hide personnel and military equipment in the ground.
The great commander proved himself to be a brilliant strategist and analyst. Based on reconnaissance data, he was able to pinpoint the area where the Germans ultimately launched their main attack. But Rokossovsky managed to create a deeply layered defense in this area and concentrate about half of his infantry, 60% of his artillery and 70% of his tanks there.
A truly innovative solution was also the artillery counter-preparation, carried out 3 hours before the start of the German offensive. Rokossovsky's defense turned out to be so strong and stable that he was able to transfer a significant part of his reserves to Vatutin when he was in danger of a breakthrough on the southern front of the Kursk Bulge.
After Battle of Kursk Konstantin Konstantinovich became a colonel general, and three months later - an army general. His fame had already thundered on all fronts; he became widely known in the West as one of the most talented Soviet military leaders. Rokossovsky was also very popular among the soldiers.
Operation Bagration
Rokossovsky’s leadership talent was fully demonstrated in the summer of 1944 during the operation to liberate the Republic of Belarus, conventionally called “Bagration”. The operation plan was developed by Rokossovsky together with A. M. Vasilevsky and G. K. Zhukov.
The strategic highlight of this plan was Rokossovsky’s proposal to strike in two main directions, which ensured coverage of the enemy’s flanks at operational depth and did not give the latter the opportunity to maneuver reserves.
On June 22, 1944, Soviet troops launched Operation Bagration, the most powerful in the history of the world wars. From Rokossovsky’s memoirs it is known that when discussing the operation plan, Stalin, not agreeing with the commander’s proposal to deliver not one, but two main strikes with the aim of encircling the enemy’s Bobruisk group, twice suggested that he go out and “think carefully.”
The front commander, however, stood his ground. Subsequent events confirmed that the proposed decision was based on sober calculation and understanding of the specific conditions of the situation.
Operating in difficult, swampy terrain, Rokossovsky's troops during the first five days of the offensive destroyed 25 German divisions and advanced 100–110 km. On the second day after the start of the operation, Stalin realized that Rokossovsky’s decision was brilliant. 
The famous British historian B. Liddell Hart was able, by comparing the successes of the Red Army and the achievements of the Anglo-American allies, who had landed in Normandy shortly before, to show the fundamental difference between them:
Having broken through the front line directly north of the Pinsk swamps, Rokossovsky’s troops continued to develop their offensive at an average speed of 32 km per day... The Russian attacks led to the general collapse of the German defense system. The allied forces on the western flank of the Norman bridgehead under the command of General O. Bradley, in three weeks of fighting against a much less formidable enemy, advanced, as Liddell Hart calculated, only 8–13 km.
Even before the end of Operation Bagration, Rokossovsky Konstantin Konstantinovich was awarded the title of Marshal of the Soviet Union, and a month later - the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. On June 29, 1944, Army General Rokossovsky was awarded the Diamond Star of the Marshal of the Soviet Union, and on July 30, the first Star of the Hero of the Soviet Union.
By July 11, 1944, a 105,000-strong enemy group was captured. When the West doubted the number of prisoners during Operation Bagration, Joseph Stalin ordered them to be marched through the streets of Moscow. From that moment on, Stalin began to call Rokossovsky by name and patronymic, and only Marshal Shaposhnikov received such an honor.
ON THE. Antipenko, Soviet military leader:
“Rokossovsky Konstantin Konstantinovich, like most major military leaders, built his work on the principle of trust in his assistants. This trust was not blind: it became complete only when he was personally convinced more than once that he was being told the truth and that everything possible had been done to solve the task; Having convinced himself of this, he saw in you a good comrade in arms, his friend. That is why the leadership of the front was so united and united: each of us sincerely valued the authority of our commander. They didn’t fear Rokossovsky at the front, they loved him.”
P.I. Batov, army general:
“He never imposed his preliminary decisions, approved of a reasonable initiative and helped develop it. Rokossovsky knew how to lead his subordinates in such a way that each officer and general willingly contributed his share of creativity to the common cause. With all this, Konstantin Konstantinovich himself and we, the commanders, well understood that the commander of our time was without a strong will, without his own firm convictions, without a personal assessment of events and people at the front, without his own style in operations, without intuition, that is, without his own “ I” cannot be. Strength Rokossovsky's activities have always been his intense desire to defeat the enemy at the cost of the least amount of personal sacrifice. He never doubted success and victory. And this iron will was transmitted to all his comrades.”
A.E. Golovanov, aviation commander:
“It is hardly possible to name another commander who would have acted so successfully in both defensive and offensive operations of the last war. Thanks to his broad military education, enormous personal culture, skillful communication with his subordinates, whom he always treated with respect, never emphasizing his official position, strong-willed qualities and outstanding organizational abilities, he gained unquestioned authority, respect and love of all those with with whom he happened to fight. Possessing the gift of foresight, he almost always accurately guessed the enemy’s intentions, forestalled them and, as a rule, emerged victorious.”
In November 1944, before the start of the Vistula-Oder operation, Rokossovsky was transferred to the post of commander of the 2nd Belorussian Front. Instead, Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov was appointed to the Berlin direction.
“Why such disgrace that I am being transferred from the main direction to a secondary area?” - Rokossovsky asked Stalin. Stalin replied that all three fronts (1st Belorussian, 2nd Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian) were the main ones, and the success of the upcoming operation would depend on their close interaction. “If you and Konev do not advance, then Zhukov will not advance anywhere...” summed up the Supreme Commander-in-Chief.
Until the end of the war, Rokossovsky commanded the 2nd Belorussian Front, whose troops, together with other fronts, crushed the enemy in the East Prussian, East Pomeranian and, finally, Berlin strategic operations. The front troops defeated the Wehrmacht formations that threatened the right flank of the Soviet troops aimed at Berlin.
The access of the 2nd Belorussian Front to the sea at Danzig, Kolberg, Swinemünde, and Rostock deprived the enemy of the opportunity to transfer troops from Courland, Norway, and Denmark to help Berlin.
On March 31, 1945, Marshal Rokossovsky was one of the first among Soviet military leaders “for the skillful leadership of major operations, as a result of which outstanding successes were achieved in the defeat of the Nazi troops”, was awarded the Order of Victory, and on May 2, 1945 he was awarded for the second time title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
On June 24, 1945, Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky commanded the historic Victory Parade in Moscow, which was hosted by Marshal Zhukov.
“I perceived command of the Victory Parade as the highest award for my entire many years of service in the Armed Forces,” the Marshal said at a Kremlin reception in honor of the parade participants.
Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov:
“Rokossovsky was a very good boss. He knew military affairs brilliantly, clearly set tasks, and intelligently and tactfully checked the execution of his orders. He showed constant attention to his subordinates and, perhaps like no one else, knew how to evaluate and develop the initiative of the commanders subordinate to him. He gave a lot to others and at the same time knew how to learn from them. I'm not even talking about his rare spiritual qualities - they are known to everyone who served at least a little under his command.
It’s hard for me to remember a more thorough, efficient, hardworking and, by and large, gifted person.”
Post-war time
In 1949, Polish President Boleslaw Bierut turned to Joseph Stalin with a request to send the Pole Rokossovsky to Poland to serve as Minister of National Defense.
In 1949-1956 the latter did great job on the reorganization of the Polish army, raising its defense capability and combat readiness in the light of modern requirements. At the same time, he was Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Poland and a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party. He was awarded military rank Marshal of Poland.
After the death of Stalin and President Bolesław Bierut, the Polish government relieved him of his posts.
In 1956-1957, Rokossovsky was deputy. Minister of Defense of the USSR (Zhukov was then minister). But in 1957 he was transferred to the commander of the Transcaucasian Military District. In 1958-1962 again - deputy. Minister of Defense and Chief Inspector of the USSR Ministry of Defense.
In 1962, when the marshal refused to write Nikita Khrushchev a “blacker and thicker” article against Joseph Stalin, the next day he was removed from his post as Deputy Minister of Defense. People close to Rokossovsky, in particular Rokossovsky’s permanent adjutant, Major General Kulchitsky, explain the above-mentioned refusal not by Rokossovsky’s devotion to Stalin, but by the commander’s deep conviction that the army should not participate in politics.
Death of Rokossovsky Konstantin Konstantinovich
Surprisingly, no one spoke in detail about Rokossovsky’s death. What is certain is that last years During his life, the marshal was in the group of inspectors general of the Ministry of Defense and was seriously ill. He died at the age of 72 on August 3, 1968. The urn with the ashes is located in the Kremlin wall.
To summarize the article and the biography of Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky, we can say that his military leadership style is characterized by the ability to avoid patterns and straightforward actions, the ability to recognize the enemy’s intentions and use it weak sides, provide maximum fire support for troops in defense and attack, the desire to achieve results not with numbers, but with skill.
M.A. Gareev, army general:
“To modern officers he set a great example of innovation and constant creativity in the art of war, which all officers must constantly learn. He did not simply react to the developing situation, but sought to influence it in in the right direction by misinforming the enemy, using unexpected methods of action, imposing one’s will, and skillfully stimulating the actions of one’s troops.”
Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky:
“The most important thing in battle is perfect coordination of actions. The front commander and the ordinary soldier at times have the same influence on success, and often ordinary soldiers, commanders of companies, battalions, and batteries make decisive contribution as a result of the battle... Of course, the decisions of the High Command are of great importance... But the main thing is the soldiers.”
In the memory of people who interacted with Rokossovsky, he remained as a tall, stately, charming person, sincere and intelligent. At the same time, he certainly possessed personal courage and courage.
THEIR. Bagramyan, twice Hero of the Soviet Union:
“Konstantin Konstantinovich stood out with his almost two-meter height. Moreover, he amazed with his grace and elegance, as he was unusually well-built and truly classically built. He behaved freely, but perhaps a little shyly, and the kind smile that illuminated his handsome face attracted people to him. This appearance was in perfect harmony with the entire spiritual structure of Konstantin Konstantinovich, which I soon became convinced of, having become close friends with him for the rest of my life. He could often be seen in the trenches, on the front line, among soldiers and officers. “If you are not in the trenches for a long time,” he said, “then you get the feeling that some kind of important line The connection has been broken, and some very valuable information is missing.”
One of the most outstanding creators of Victory, Rokossovsky summed up his military leadership as follows:
“The greatest happiness for a soldier is the knowledge that you helped your people defeat the enemy, defend the freedom of the Motherland, and return peace to it. The consciousness that you have fulfilled your soldier’s duty, a difficult and noble duty, higher than which there is nothing on earth!”
Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky.
On August 3, 1968, fifty years ago, Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky, one of the most outstanding Soviet military leaders who made a tremendous contribution to the victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War, died in Moscow. The death of the famous commander at the age of 71 was the sad result of a serious illness that Rokossovsky suffered in the last years of his life.
Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky was truly a unique person. It was he who commanded the Victory Parade on June 24, 1945 on Red Square in Moscow, and the parade was hosted by Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov. Two pillars Great Victory– Zhukov and Rokossovsky were outstanding commanders and very different people from each other. My grandfather, who spent the entire war as the commander of an artillery battery, said that the Rokossovsky Coast of people in general was much softer and more intelligent than Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov, a difficult and harsh man.
The life of Konstantin Rokossovsky went through many trials, but the Marshal also received a lot of awards after the Great Victory. He became the only military leader in our country who received the rank of marshal in two different countries - the Soviet Union and Poland. It was he who covered Moscow and captured the army of Field Marshal Paulus at Stalingrad. After the war, Rokossovsky served as Poland's Minister of National Defense for seven years, from 1949 to 1956. This was also not surprising - it was in Warsaw in 1896 that the future Soviet military leader was born. He was an ethnic Pole of gentry origin.
Konstantin's father Ksaviry Jozef Rokossovsky (already in adulthood, the future marshal changed his patronymic name to a more convenient one for Russian pronunciation “Konstantinovich”) was a representative of the noble family of the coat of arms of Glyaubich, who served as an auditor on the Warsaw Railway. After the suppression of the Polish uprising of 1863, the nobility was taken away from the Rokossovskys. The great-grandfather of the future Soviet marshal took part in the War of 1812, serving as a second lieutenant in the 2nd Uhlan Regiment of the Duchy of Warsaw. Rokossovsky's mother Antonina Ovsyannikova was Belarusian by nationality. The early death of his father forced Konstantin back in adolescence begin labor activity. He was an assistant to a pastry chef and a dentist, worked as a stonemason in a workshop, not forgetting about self-education. When World War I began, young Rokossovsky volunteered for the active army. Thus began his military career, which would last throughout his life. 
The young man was enlisted to serve in the 5th Dragoon Kargopol Regiment, which was part of the 5th Cavalry Division of the 12th Army. As a volunteer, Rokossovsky served as a hunter, participated in numerous reconnaissance raids and soon received the rank of corporal and the St. George Cross of the 4th degree. Konstantin fought bravely, for which he was awarded, and on March 29, 1917, after the February Revolution, he was promoted to junior non-commissioned officer. As an authoritative soldier, Rokossovsky was elected to the squadron and then to the regimental committees of the regiment.
When the October Revolution occurred, Konstantin Rokossovsky, who sympathized with the Bolsheviks, joined the Kargopol Red Guard detachment, and then the Red Army. Fifty years of Konstantin Konstantinovich’s subsequent life were associated with military service to the Soviet state. Rokossovsky participated in the Civil War - as an assistant commander of the Kargopol detachment, then as a squadron commander of the 1st Ural Volodarsky Cavalry Regiment, division commander, commander of the 30th Cavalry Regiment of the 30th Division of the 5th Army of the Red Army. In March 1919, Konstantin Rokossovsky joined the RCP (b). In the early 1920s. Rokossovsky took part in hostilities in Transbaikalia - against the troops of Baron Ungern, and then other white commanders. In 1924-1925 He received his first military education - he attended the Cavalry Advanced Course for Command Staff of the Red Army, after which he served for some time as an instructor in the Mongolian People's Republic cavalry division in Mongolia.
The military leadership genius of Rokossovsky is all the more surprising because the military leader never received a classical military education - he studied at the mentioned courses, then completed a three-month advanced training course for senior command personnel at the M. V. Frunze Academy. In 1929-1930 Rokossovsky commanded the 5th separate Kuban Cavalry Brigade, stationed near Verkhneudinsk, as part of which he participated in the Manchu-Zhalaynor offensive operation of the Red Army. In 1930-1932 Rokossovsky held the position of commander of the 7th Samara Cavalry Division, in which Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov served as commander of one of the brigades at that time. In 1932-1936. Rokossovsky commanded the 15th Separate Kuban Cavalry Division, receiving the rank of division commander in 1935.
In 1936, Konstantin Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the 5th Cavalry Corps with a deployment in Pskov, and already in the following 1937, the military leader began to have a dark streak in his life. Like a huge number of other Soviet commanders, Rokossovsky fell under the merciless flywheel of repression. On June 27, 1937, he was expelled from the CPSU (b), on July 22, 1937, he was dismissed from the army “due to official inconsistency,” and in August 1937 he was arrested. The future marshal spent almost three years in prisons and camps. He was tortured and beaten, but if we compare Rokossovsky’s fate with the fate of other Red commanders, he was very lucky. Rokossovsky survived.
On March 22, 1940, he was released, rehabilitated and reinstated in the party and rank. Since general ranks were introduced in the Red Army in the same year, division commander Rokossovsky received the rank of major general. Throughout the spring of 1940, he recovered from his experiences over these two and a half years, relaxing with his family at a resort in Sochi. After his leave, Rokossovsky was assigned to the Kiev Special Military District, which by this time was commanded by Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov, once a subordinate, and now Rokossovsky’s commander. During the time that Rokossovsky was in prison, Zhukov made a brilliant military career and already had the rank of army general. Rokossovsky was to form and lead the 9th Mechanized Corps as part of the Kyiv Special Military District, finding himself subordinate to his former subordinate.
As a corps commander, Rokossovsky met the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. At this time, it seemed that Rokossovsky, just a major general and corps commander, would never be able to catch up with his old colleague Georgy Zhukov, the army general who headed the general staff of the Red Army in June - July 1941. However, fate decreed otherwise. The Great Patriotic War brought Rokossovsky, who by June 1941 was only one of many Soviet major generals, national and even worldwide fame. But Konstantin Konstantinovich achieved this fame on the battlefield, literally with his own blood.
For his successful actions, he was promoted to commander of the 4th Army, operating on the southern flank of the Western Front. Then he was assigned to lead the task force to restore the situation in the Smolensk region, which was soon transformed into the 16th Army. On September 11, 1941, Rokossovsky received the rank of lieutenant general. As an army commander, he took part in the most difficult battle near Moscow. It was at Rokossovsky’s disposal that a regiment of Kremlin cadets was created from the personnel of the Moscow Infantry School named after. Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR, the famous 316th Infantry Division of Major General Ivan Panfilov, 3rd Cavalry Corps of Major General Lev Dovator.
The Battle of Moscow, during which Rokossovsky showed himself admirably as a talented and brave military leader, became another turning point in his fate. If at first they did not really trust yesterday’s repressed man and even in official communications they did not mention the name of the army commander, speaking about a certain “Commander R,” then after the defense of Moscow, the attitude towards Rokossovsky on the part of the Soviet leadership began to change for the better. On July 13, 1942, he was appointed commander of the troops of the Bryansk Front, and on September 30, commander of the troops of the Don Front.
It was under the command of Rokossovsky that the forces of several fronts organized a ring around the army of General Paulus. On January 15, 1943, Rokossovsky received the rank of Colonel General, and already on January 31, troops under his command captured Field Marshal Paulus, 24 German generals, 2,500 officers and more than 90 thousand lower ranks of the Wehrmacht. After such a triumphant success, Stalin entrusted Rokossovsky with command of the Central Front, and in April 1943 he was promoted to army general. Success on the Kursk Bulge is also largely the work of Rokossovsky. In October 1943, the Central Front was renamed the Belorussian Front. It was mainly through his forces that the liberation was carried out. Soviet Belarus from the Nazi invaders.
On June 29, 1944, Konstantin Rokossovsky received the highest military rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union, and on July 30, the first Gold Star of Hero of the Soviet Union. But, nevertheless, when the choice was made who to entrust command Soviet armies, advancing on Berlin, Stalin settled on the candidacy of Georgy Zhukov. Konstantin Rokossovsky was appointed commander of the 2nd Belorussian Front, and Marshal Zhukov led the 1st Belorussian Front.
Naturally, this situation seemed offensive to Rokossovsky and he even asked Stalin what the reason for his transfer to the post of commander of the 2nd Belorussian Front was connected with, to which the leader replied that this post was no less important for the military leader. But, of course, Rokossovsky’s Polish nationality, and his past as a former repressed person who spent almost three years in camps, could also play a role in Joseph Vissarionovich’s decision.
However, the contribution of Rokossovsky and his front formations to the assault on Berlin was also enormous. Troops under the command of Rokossovsky liberated Pomerania and East Prussia, then pinned down the main forces of the 3rd German Tank Army, preventing them from preventing Soviet troops advancing on Berlin. On June 1, 1945, for successful operations in Germany, Rokossovsky was given the second Gold Star of the Hero of the Soviet Union. By Stalin's decision, Marshal Zhukov hosted the Victory Parade on Red Square, and Marshal Rokossovsky commanded the parade. In July 1945, he headed the Northern Group of Forces, stationed in Poland, and held this position until 1949. It was under the leadership of Rokossovsky that the entire infrastructure was created, which for almost half a century ensured the Soviet military presence in Poland. 
In 1949, PPR President Boleslav Bierut asked Stalin to allow Rokossovsky to transfer to Polish service. So the Soviet marshal became the Marshal of Poland and the Minister of National Defense of the People's Republic of Poland. It was under the leadership of Rokossovsky that the Polish Army was modernized, becoming one of the most powerful armies of the socialist camp. However, in 1956, due to political changes in Poland, Rokossovsky was recalled back to Soviet Union. He was appointed to the post of Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, then commander of the Transcaucasian Military District. From January 1958 to April 1962, he again served as Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, but was dismissed due to disagreements with Nikita Khrushchev. According to one version, Rokossovsky refused to write a fiery anti-Stalin article, which angered the first secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. From April 1962 to August 1968, until his death, Konstantin Rokossovsky served as inspector general of the Group of Inspectors General of the USSR Ministry of Defense.
Konstantin Rokossovsky is one of the few Soviet military leaders of this rank who enjoyed not only respect, but also sincere love among the troops. Even those who did not agree with some of his actions spoke about their sympathy for Rokossovsky. For example, the same Nikita Khrushchev noted the highest professionalism and excellent human qualities of the marshal. Soviet soldiers - marshals, generals, officers and ordinary soldiers who happened to serve under his command - remembered Konstantin Konstantinovich even more warmly. As a person, Rokossovsky, apparently, differed favorably from many other military leaders - he tried to do everything possible to save soldiers’ lives, and did without swearing or assault.
One of the main positive features that contemporaries noted in Rokossovsky was that he always positioned himself only as a soldier, not concerned with politics. Unlike Georgy Zhukov, Rokossovsky was not allowed into the Kremlin until the end of the war; such epoch-making events in the country’s history as the death of Stalin and the subsequent arrest of Beria and the seizure of power by Khrushchev passed him by.