Today 18 April 2015. On this day in military history:
In 1942:
German troops began their advance in Eastern Ukraine to the oil fields of the Caucasus.
In Burma, while the allies attention was diverted by the desperate struggle for oil fields, the Japanese troops in the area Loikaw-Toungoo in 6 days defeated the 6th Chinese army came to the aid of allies.
American aircraft launched the first air RAID on Japan – 16 bombers, breaking the 1300 kilometers, freely dropped bombs on Tokyo, Yokohama, Nagoya and Kobe.
In 1943:
This week (11-17 April) in air battles and on the airfields of the enemy destroyed German aircraft 302.
By order of the Commissar of defense Stalin on the Intelligence of the General staff was responsible for the management of military and covert intelligence fronts. This order adopted Stalin abolished in October of 1942 the order, according to which one was withdrawn GRU military intelligence, and the intelligence fronts was prohibited conduct human intelligence. All secret information sent and summarized in GRU and therefore had fronts until very late. From April 18 intelligence fronts got a lot of autonomy.
Died commander-in-chief of the Navy of Japan Isoroku Yamamoto. Admiral in April 1943 arrived in the combat area in the Solomon Islands to study the situation. The Americans, alerted by radio intercepts, sent him 16 fighters, which are lured, knocked out and burned the plane of Japanese Admiral.
In 1944:
The independent coastal army liberated Balaclava. Solution Rates army was renamed Primorsko and part of the 4th Ukrainian front.
Under the pressure of superior forces of the red Army, German and Romanian troops hastily retreated to Sevastopol, which Hitler had declared a "fortress Sevastopol" and ordered to hold it. Just focused there 50 thousand Germans and Romanians. The city was liberated on 9 may.
On the night of April 18, our air force long-range has made a massive departure on the railway junction and sea port of Constanta (Romania).
The Germans attempt to destroy the traces of their bloody crimes. In Kaunas and its surroundings, the Germans burned the corpses of Soviet citizens killed during the occupation. In 1941 and 1942 the Germans on the territory Hport shot and buried about 30 thousand people. A few months ago the Gestapo formed a special team that breaks up the mass graves, remove the bodies, puts them in piles and burn. The Germans are trying to keep it a secret. Hvort the whole area is declared as prohibited area. German authorities put them up in order, which warned residents that anyone who comes near in the Fort, will be immediately shot.
In 1945:
Troops of the 1st Ukrainian front broke through nashenski the defensive line of the enemy and crossed the river spree on the outskirts of Berlin. Our troops continued fighting to destroy the remnants of German forces, dropped in the district Pillau. South of the city of Ratibor employs 30 settlements, on the territory of Czechoslovakia – 10.
The allies destroyed in the Ruhr "bag" the 21st German division and took Magdeburg and Dusseldorf, and then surrounded by the German troops surrendered. This has led to the actual collapse of the entire Western front.
In the Netherlands the Germans made a breach in the dam at Hoek van Holland, and the waters Zehnder-Zee rushed in the direction of Amsterdam. 1 canadian army has suspended military operations and concluded a temporary truce with German Colonel General Johannes von Blaskowitz that have agreed not to flood over the country and give the opportunity to provide food to the starving civilian population. However, to capitulate Blaskovic refused.
The newspaper "Krasnaya Zvezda" reported: put into operation the first turn of the Nikolaev energicamente, blown up by the invaders.
