Strategic offensive operation

The Wehrmacht's offensive on the plan of Operation Blau , 1942

Operation Bagration in the summer of 1944

Strategic offensive operation - a military operation , in the general form, which is a set of coordinated and interrelated in purpose, objectives, place and time of simultaneous and sequential battles, combat and special operations, strikes, maneuvers and actions of troops (forces) carried out according to a single plan and plan by attacking to achieve a strategic goal with the aim of defeating the enemy’s forces and mastering certain areas of the terrain in certain strategic directions.

The theory and practice of strategic offensive operations began to take shape during the First World War ( East Prussian operation , Battle of Galicia , Brusilovsky breakthrough ).

Strategic offensive operations were further developed during the Second World War . These operations, as a rule, were carried out by forces of front groups (several army groups ) in cooperation with long-range aviation , and in coastal directions by the naval forces .

The goals of strategic offensive operations are achieved in various ways: by encircling large enemy groups with their subsequent destruction; dissection of the strategic front; fragmentation of the strategic front and the destruction of isolated groupings in parts. All these methods were combined in many strategic offensive operations. When choosing the directions of the main attacks, the whole combination of political, economic and military factors was taken into account. So, for example, during the German-Soviet war (on the Eastern Front of WWII) in the first period, the main blows were delivered to enemy groups that threatened the vital centers of the USSR (Moscow, St. Petersburg, the Caucasus). At the final stage of the war, the main blows were delivered in directions that led to the economic and political centers of Germany by the shortest route.