Soviet army marshal who was in command of the 4th Ukrainian Front at the end of World War II. Born in Markovka, Russia, on 14 October 1892, Andrei Yeremenko was drafted into the Russian army in 1913. He fought in World War I as a junior officer. He joined the Red Guards in October 1917 and the Red Army and Communist Party in 1918. Yeremenko fought as a cavalry officer in the Russian Civil War, ending that conflict as deputy commander of a regiment. He then commanded a regiment and attended the Military Political Academy and the Frunze Military Academy in 1935. Yeremenko commanded a cavalry division between 1935 and 1938, then the VI Cossack Cavalry Corps, which he led in the Soviet invasion of eastern Poland in September 1939.

In June 1940, Yeremenko took command of a mechanized corps and was promoted to lieutenant general. When the German army invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, he was commanding the First Red Banner Far Eastern Army. Recalled to the west, he replaced General Dimitri Pavlov as Western Front commander, helping to restore a degree of stability. An outstanding tactician, he understood the importance of airpower and the need to mass armor.

In August 1941, Yeremenko assumed command of the new Bryansk Front, where he was seriously wounded in October. After his recovery, he was promoted to colonel general and put in command of Fourth Shock Army in the defense of Moscow. Again seriously wounded in February 1942, Yeremenko took command of the Southeast Front, defending Stalingrad, in August. In January 1943, he assumed command of the Southern Front, pushing the Germans out of the Caucasus. Transferred to command the Kalinin Front in April 1943, he was made General of the Army in August.

Yeremenko commanded the 1st Baltic Front in October and November 1943 for the advance on Smolensk. He then led the Independent (Black Sea) Maritime Front in the eastern Crimea, before heading the 4th Ukrainian Front from March to July 1945.

Following the end of the war, Yeremenko commanded, in turn, the Carpathian, West Siberian, and North Caucasus Military Districts until 1958. He next served as inspector general of the Ministry of Defense, until his death in Moscow on 19 November 1970.

Spencer C. Tucker

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Further Reading
Bialer, Seweryn, ed. Stalin and His Generals: Soviet Military Memoirs of World War II. New York: Pegasus, 1969.; Shukman, Harold, ed. Stalin's Generals. New York: Grove Press, 1993.