At 3:30 AM, Sunday, June 22nd 1941, Nazi Germany brutally and ruthlessly attacked Soviet Russia. It was termed: Operation Barbarossa. And, up until that time, it wa the single largest land invasion force in the history of warfare.

The German Order of Battle for this invasion consumed more than 70% of their active ground forces, and was as follows. First, it contained three separate Army Groups; North, Center, and South. This amounted to a combined military force of nearly 3.5 million men, supported by over 7000 artillery pieces, and 70000 military vehicles.

Specificaly, the makeup of each Army Group unfolded like this. First, Army Group North contained two armies, the Sixteenth and the Eighteenth, and was spearheaded by the Fourth Panzergruppe. Together, this powerful force consisted of 26 Infantry divisions and three Panzer divisions. Next in line was Army Group Center. It was almost twice as strong as Army Group North was. Army Group Center contained two armies, the Fourth and the Ninth, and was spearhead by, not one, but two enormous Panzergruppes, the Second and Third. All told, AGC was comprised of 51 infantry divisions and nine Panzer divisions. The final formation, Army Group South, was also very powerful. It contained three German Armies, the Sixth [The same one that would be grinded to pieces at Stalingrad], the Eleventh, and the Seventeenth, and was spearhead by the First Panzergruppe. AGS also included soldiers from the German Satellite nations of Romania and Hungary. This consisted of the Romanian Third and Fourth Armies, and the Hungarian First Army. Together the combined forces that made up AGS would storm into battle with 59 infantry divisions and five Panzer divisions.

In addition, each Army Group was supported by a giganitic airfleet of the German Airforce called the Luftwaffe. Specifically, Luftwaffe I provided cover for AGN, while Luftwaffe II supported AGC, and Luftwaffe IV did the same for AGS. All told, the entire air armada was comprised of over 2200 fighters and dive bombers along with 800 medium bombers.

In summation, the German assault upon Soviet Russia was undertaken by the most enormous ground invasion force in military history. However, it must also be stated that less than 47 months later, this entire force would be utterly destroyed in an endless agonizing struggle that redefined the term, brutality.