<P> In accordance with the Soviet - Nazi Molotov--Ribbentrop Pact of 23 August 1939, the Red Army invaded Poland on 17 September 1939, after the Nazi invasion on 1 September 1939 . On 30 November the Red Army also attacked Finland, in the Winter War of 1939--1940 . By autumn 1940, after conquering its portion of Poland, the Third Reich shared an extensive border with USSR, with whom it remained neutrally bound by their non-aggression pact and trade agreements . Another consequence of the Molotov - Ribbentrop Pact was the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, carried out by the Southern Front in June--July 1940 and Soviet occupation of the Baltic states (1940). These conquests also added to the border the Soviet Union shared with Nazi - controlled areas . For Adolf Hitler, the circumstance was no dilemma, because the Drang nach Osten ("Drive towards the East") policy secretly remained in force, culminating on 18 December 1940 with Directive No. 21, Operation Barbarossa, approved on 3 February 1941, and scheduled for mid-May 1941 . </P> <P> When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, in Operation Barbarossa, the Red Army's ground forces had 303 divisions and 22 separate brigades (6.8 million soldiers), including 166 divisions and 9 brigades (3.2 million soldiers) garrisoned in the western military districts . The Axis forces deployed on the Eastern Front consisted of 181 divisions and 18 brigades (3 million soldiers). Three Fronts, the Northwestern, Western, and Southwestern conducted the defense of the western borders of the USSR . In the first weeks of the Great Patriotic War the Wehrmacht defeated many Red Army units . The Red Army lost millions of men as prisoners and lost much of its pre-war matériel . Stalin increased mobilization, and by 1 August 1941, despite 46 divisions lost in combat, the Red Army's strength was 401 divisions . </P> <P> The Soviet forces were apparently unprepared despite numerous warnings from a variety of sources . They suffered much damage in the field because of mediocre officers, partial mobilization, and an incomplete reorganization . The hasty pre-war forces expansion and the over-promotion of inexperienced officers (owing to the purging of experienced officers) favored the Wehrmacht in combat . The Axis's numeric superiority rendered the combatants' divisional strength approximately equal . A generation of Soviet commanders (notably Georgy Zhukov) learned from the defeats, and Soviet victories in the Battle of Moscow, at Stalingrad, Kursk and later in Operation Bagration proved decisive . </P> <P> In 1941, the Soviet government raised the bloodied Red Army's esprit de corps with propaganda stressing the defense of Motherland and nation, employing historic exemplars of Russian courage and bravery against foreign aggressors . The anti-Nazi Great Patriotic War was conflated with the Patriotic War of 1812 against Napoleon, and historical Russian military heroes, such as Alexander Nevski and Mikhail Kutuzov, appeared . Repression of the Russian Orthodox Church temporarily ceased, and priests revived the tradition of blessing arms before battle . </P>

Leader of the chinese red army during ww2