Dmitry Pavlov (general)

Dmitry Grigorevich Pavlov (Дми́трий Григо́рьевич Па́влов, October 23, 1897 – July 22, 1941) was a Soviet general who commanded the key Soviet Western Front during the initial days of the German invasion of the Soviet Union, or Operation Barbarossa, in June 1941. After his forces were heavily defeated in the first days of the campaign, he was relieved of his command, arrested, charged with military incompetence and then executed. He was exonerated (or rehabilitated in Soviet parlance) in 1956.

Military career
He was a veteran of the First World War, as well as the Russian Civil War, serving in the Red Army since 1919. He graduated from the Frunze Military Academy in 1928. He then commanded various mechanised and cavalry units. As one of the Soviet military advisers, in 1936-37 he took part in the Spanish Civil War on the Republican side (using the nom de guerre Pablo ) and commanded a brigade of Soviet tanks, for which he was made a Hero of the Soviet Union. In contrast to many other officers who took part in that war, he was not purged after his return to the Soviet Union, and was made the Head of the Directorate of Tank and Armoured Car Troops of the Red Army which gave him considerable influence on its development. In particular he insisted that tanks be shifted to infantry support roles, which in hindsight turned out to be incorrect. He participated in the Winter War, as well as the border clashes with Japan.

In 1940 he became the commander of the Western (Belorussian) Special Military District, which became the Soviet Western Front bearing the brunt of German attack during Operation Barbarossa in June, 1941. On February 22, 1941, he was one of the first Soviet generals to receive the new rank of General of the Army, inferior only to the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union.

Downfall
After the units under his command suffered a disastrous defeat in the Battle of Białystok-Minsk, during the first days of the invasion, Pavlov was relieved of his command, arrested and accused of criminal incompetence and treason.

He and his chief of staff Klimovskikh were first accused of:

As the members of the anti-Soviet military conspiracy, betrayed the interests of the Motherland, violated the oath of office and damaged the combat power of the Red Army that are crimes under Articles 58-1b, 58-11 RSFSR Criminal Code...A preliminary judicial investigation and determined that the defendants Pavlov and Klimovskikh being: the first - the commander of the Western Front, and the second - the chief of staff of the same front, during the outbreak of hostilities with the German forces against the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, showed cowardice, failure of power, mismanagement, allowed the collapse of command and control, surrender of weapons to the enemy without fighting, willful abandonment of military positions by the Red Army, the most disorganized defense of the country and enabled the enemy to break through the front of the Red Army.

Pavlov and his deputies were accused of "failure to perform their duties" rather than treason. On July 22, 1941 the same day the sentence was handed down, Pavlov's property was confiscated, and he was deprived of military rank, shot and buried in a landfill near Moscow by the NKVD.

Death penalties were also passed down for other commanders of the Western Front, including the Chief of Staff, Major General B. E. Klimovskikh; the chief of the communications corps, Major General AT Grigoriev; the Chief of Artillery, Lieutenant General of Artillery A. Klich; and Air Force Deputy Chief of the Western Front (who, after the suicide of Major General Aviation II Kopec, was, nominally at least, Chief of the Air Force of the Western Front), Major General Aviation A. I. Tayursky. Also, the commander of the 14th Mechanized Corps, Major General C. I. Oborin, was arrested on July 8 and shot. The commander of the 4th Army, Major General A. A. Korobkov, was dismissed on July 8, arrested the next day and shot on July 22.

Pavlov and other commanders of Western Front were exonerated as "lacking evidence" in 1956.