The initial German front was 995 miles long. The main front would soon expand to 1490 miles and extend to a depth of over 600 miles. Into this great space of steppe, forest and swamp marched the best of the German Army, amounting to three quarters of its field strength.

By the end of the year, the Germans had seized most of the Soviet territory in the west, surrounded St. Petersburg (having been renamed once again as Leningrad), and advanced to within miles of Moscow. About 3,500,000 Red Army soldiers were in captivity and 4,000,000 had died in battle. At one time the Germans occupied some 900,000 square miles of Soviet territory.

Thanks to the tenacity of the Russian people and the leadership of Field Marshall Valeri Zhukov, the Russians were able to eventually defeat the Germans. General winter also played a part as it had against the French invaders of a previous century.