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• Hitlers ordered that the Russian city of Leningrad was to be besieged, not captured. ww2dbase [Siege of Leningrad | TH]
• M-172, under the command of Israel Fisanovich, became the first M-class submarine to have broken into an enemy port and to successfully sink a target. ww2dbase [Israel Fisanovich | CPC]

• Comandante Cappellini sighted an illuminated Portuguese ship in the Atlantic Ocean at 0030 hours. At 2200 hours, the Italian submarine received orders to move to a new patrol area. ww2dbase [Comandante Cappellini | CPC]

• Japanese aircraft sank Chinese gunboats Jiangxi and Jiangkun at Bazhong, Sichuan Province, China. ww2dbase [Bazhong, Sichuan | CPC]

• A German naval cadet became the first victim of French Resistance, shot in a Metro station in Paris, France. Over 150 Parisians were shot in reprisal. ww2dbase [The French Resistance | Paris | TH]

• Adolf Hitler directed the transfer of units away from the Moscow, Russia area in order to bolster the siege on Leningrad (aiming for the linking up with Finnish forces) and the battles in Ukraine (aiming for the oil fields in the Caucasus region). ww2dbase [Adolf Hitler | CPC]

• The first Allied Arictic convoy, codenamed Dervish, set sail from Hvalfjörður, Iceland for Arhangelsk, Russia. ww2dbase [Arctic Convoys | Hvalfjörður | CPC]

21 Aug 1941 Interactive Map