World War II Database

Contributor: C. Peter Chen

ww2dbaseBetween 1922 and 1936, Armenia was a part of the Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic. In 1936, it became the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, a republic of the Soviet Union. In 1937, a great purge took place in Armenia, which was oversaw personally by Lavrentiy Beria, Anastas Mikoyan, and Georgy Malenkov. Joseph Stalin's political opponents and organized religion were among the two elements of Armenia that suffered the most during the purge; while members of the former were executed or deported to Siberia, the latter was able to survive in secret. During WW2, Armenia was among the targets of the German operation Case Blue (Fall Blau), but German forces never reached the region. Somewhere between 300,000 to 500,000 Armenians served with the Soviet forces between 1941 and 1945, and as much as half of them were killed or became missing in action. Ivan Bagramyan became the highest ranking Armenian in the Soviet military, having given front-level command during the war and later reaching the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union. Armenia remained a Soviet republic after the war until its proclmation of independence as the Republic of Armenia in Sep 1991.