Brusilov Offensive The Brusilov Offensive ( " Brusilovskiĭ proryv " ) , also known as the June Advance , was the Russian Empire ' s greatest feat of arms during World War I , and among the most lethal battles in world history . Prof . Graydon A . Tunstall of the University of South Florida called the Brusilov Offensive of 1916 the worst crisis of World War I for Austria - Hungary and the Triple Entente ' s greatest victory . It was a major offensive against the armies of the Central Powers on the Eastern Front , launched on June 4 , 1916 , and lasting until late September . It took place in what today is Ukraine , in the general vicinity of the towns of Lviv , Kovel and Lutsk . The offensive was named after the Russian commander in charge of the Southwestern Front , Gen . Aleksei Brusilov . Background . Under the terms of the Chantilly Agreement of December 1915 Russia , France , Britain and Italy were committed to simultaneous attacks against the Central Powers in the summer of 1916 . Russia felt the need to lend troops to fight in France and Salonika ( against her own wishes ) , and to attack on the Eastern Front , in the hope of obtaining munitions from Britain and France . The Russians also initiated the disastrous Lake Naroch Offensive in the Vilno area , during which the Germans suffered only one - fifth as many casualties as the Russians , which was launched at French request , in the hope that the Germans would transfer more units to the East after their attack on Verdun . Gen . Aleksei Brusilov presented his plan to Stavka , the Russian high command , proposing a massive offensive by his Southwestern Front against the Austro - Hungarian forces in Galicia . The main purpose of Brusilov ' s operation was to take some of the pressure off French and British armies in France and the Italian Army along the Isonzo Front and , if possible , to knock Austria - Hungary out of the war . Russian plan . Gen . Alexei Evert , commander of the Russian Western Army Group , favored a defensive strategy and was opposed to Brusilov ' s offensive . Tsar Nicholas II had taken personal command of the army in 1915 . Evert was a strong supporter of Nicholas and the Romanov s , but the Tsar approved Brusilov ' s plan . The objectives were to be the cities of Kovel and Lviv , which had been lost to the Central Powers the previous year . Although Stavka had approved Brusilov ' s plan , his request for supporting offensives by neighboring fronts was effectively denied . Preparations . Mounting pressure from the western Allies caused the Russians to hurry their preparations . Brusilov amassed four armies totaling 40 infantry divisions and 15 cavalry divisions . He faced 39 Austrian infantry divisions and 10 cavalry divisions , formed in a row of three defensive lines , although later German reinforcements were brought up . Brusilov , knowing he would not receive significant reinforcements , moved his reserves up to the front line . He used them to dig entrenchments about 300 meters long and 90 meters wide all along the front line . These provided shelter for the troops and hindered observation by the Austrians . The Russians secretly crept to within of the Austrian lines and at some points as close as . Brusilov prepared for a surprise assault along a front . The Stavka urged Brusilov to considerably shorten his attacking front to allow for a much heavier concentration of Russian troops . Brusilov , however , insisted on his plan and the Stavka relented . Breakthrough . On June 4 the Russians opened the offensive with a massive , accurate but brief artillery barrage against the Austro - Hungarian lines . The key factor in this was the brevity and accuracy of the bombardment ; the customary , protracted barrages of the day gave the defenders time to bring up reserves and evacuate forward trenches , while damaging the battlefield so badly that it was hard for attackers to advance . The initial attack was successful and the Austro - Hungarian lines were broken , enabling three of Brusilov ' s four armies to advance on a wide front ( see : Battle of Kostiuchnówka ) . The success of the breakthrough was helped in large part by Brusilov ' s innovation of shock troops to attack weak points along the Austrian lines to effect a breakthrough , which the main Russian army could then exploit . Brusilov ' s tactical innovations laid the foundation for the German infiltration tactics used later in the Western Front . Battle . On June 8 forces of the Southwestern Front took Lutsk . The Austrian commander , Archduke Josef Ferdinand , barely managed to escape the city before the Russians entered , a testament to the speed of the Russian advance . By now the Austrians were in full retreat and the Russians had taken over 200 , 000 prisoners . Brusilov ' s forces were becoming overextended and he made it clear that further success of the operation depended on Evert launching his part of the offensive . Evert , however , continued to delay , which gave the German high command time to send reinforcements to the Eastern Front . In a meeting held on the same day Lutsk fell , German Chief of Staff Erich von Falkenhayn persuaded his Austrian counterpart Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf to pull troops away from the Italian Front to counter the Russians in Galicia . Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg , Germany ' s commander in the East ( Oberkommando - Ost ) , was again able to capitalize on good railroads to bring German reinforcements to the front . Finally , on June 18 a weak and poorly prepared offensive commenced under Evert . On July 24 Alexander von Linsingen counterattacked the Russians south of Kovel and temporarily checked them . On July 28 Brusilov resumed his own offensive , and although his armies were short on supplies he reached the Carpathian Mountains by September 20 . The Russian high command started transferring troops from Evert ' s front to reinforce Brusilov , a transfer Brusilov strongly opposed because more troops only served to clutter his front . All forces involved were reaching exhaustion and the offensive finally died down in late September and ended as Russian troops had to be transferred to help Romania , which was being overrun by Austro - Hungarian , German and Bulgarian forces . Romania had been inspired to join the war by Russia ' s initial success against Austro - Hungarian troops ; however , they were quickly defeated and as a result enemy forces moved closer to Russia and opened a new front for Russian forces . International reactions . On 18 June 1916 , an article " Hero of the Hour in Russia , Described Intimately by One Who Knows Him Well " by Brusilov ' s brother - in - law , Charles Johnson , appeared in the New York Times . Results . Brusilov ' s operation achieved its original goal of forcing Germany to halt its attack on Verdun and transfer considerable forces to the East . It also broke the back of the Austro - Hungarian army , which suffered the majority of the casualties . The Austro - Hungarian army was never able to mount a successful attack alone after that . Instead , it had to rely on the German army for its military successes . The early success of the offensive convinced Romania to enter the war on the side of the Entente , though that turned out to be a bad decision since it led to the failure of the 1916 campaign . Russian casualties were considerable , numbering up to half a million . The Brusilov Offensive is listed among the most lethal battles in world history . The Brusilov Offensive was the high point of the Russian effort during World War I , and was a manifestation of good leadership and planning on the part of the Imperial Russian Army . The operation was marked by a considerable improvement in the quality of Russian tactics . Brusilov used smaller , specialized units to attack weak points in the Austro - Hungarian trench lines and blow open holes for the rest of the army to advance into . These were a remarkable departure from the human wave attack s that had dominated the strategy of all the major armies until that point during World War I . The irony was that the Russians themselves did not realize the potential of the tactics that Brusilov had devised . Similar tactics were beginning to be used on the Western Front by the French and Germans - who utilized " storm troopers " to great effect in the 1918 offensive - and slightly later the British , although given the higher force - space ratio in the west much greater concentration of artillery fire was needed to make progress . Shock tactics were later to play a large role in the early German blitzkrieg offensives of World War II and the later attacks by the Soviet Union and the Western Allies to defeat Germany , and continued until the Korean War and the First Indochina War , which spelled the end of the era of mass trench warfare in all but a few nations , mostly in Africa .