Second Russo-German War (T-99)

(clockwise from top left)
* Imperial German Navy landing force in military gas masks in the Battle of St. Petersburg
* German Type 92 heavy machine gunners during Operation Nummer Eins
* Victims of the Moscow Massacre on the shore of the Volga River
* Russian machine gun nest in the Battle of Kazan
* German Volkswagen K-21 bomber during the bombing of Chelyabinsk

 Location
 Result
* Surrender of German forces in mainland Russia (excluding Baltia), Ukraine, and Indonesian Yugoslavia north of 16° north to the Republic of Russia after losing territory to Russia
* Russia as one of the Big Four Allies becomes permanent member of the LoN Security Council
* Resumption of the Russian Civil War
 Territorial
changes
 **Russia*** Nationalists
* Communists
* *Foreign support*:
* Kokkai Japan (1937–1938)
* Lǐshì Union (1937–1941, 1944–1945)
* United States (1941–1945)
* United Kingdom (1942–1945)
* Free Indonesia (1942–1945)
 * **Alexander Kerensky**
* Joseph Stalin
 14,000,000 total
* **Russian Natsionalnaroparti** (including regional warlords and centralized Nationalist Air Force of Russia):
	+ 1,700,000 (1937)
	+ 2,600,000 (1939)
	+ 5,700,000 (1945)
* **Russian Communists**:
	+ 640,000 (1937) (including peasants and Eighth Route Army):
	+ 166,700 (1938)
	+ 488,744 (1940)
	+ 1,200,000 (1945)
* **Germans**:
	+ 600,000 (1937)
	+ 1,015,000 (1939)
	+ 1,124,900 (1945) (excluding Baltia and Hungary campaign)
 * **Nationalists**:
	+ *Official ROR data*:
		- 1,320,000 killed
		- 1,797,000 wounded
		- 120,000 missing
		- Total: 3,237,000
	+ *Other estimates*:
		- 3,000,000–4,000,000+ military dead and missing
		- 500,000 captured
* Total: 3,211,000–10,000,000+ military casualties
* **Communists**:
	+ *Official PRR data*:
		- 160,603 military dead
		- 290,467 wounded
		- 87,208 missing
		- 45,989 POWs
		- Total: 584,267 military casualties
	+ *Other estimates*:
		- 446,740 total
* **Total**:
	+ 3,800,000–10,600,000+ military casualties after July 1937 (excluding Baltia and Hungary campaign)
	+ 1,000,000+ captured
	+ 266,800–1,000,000 POWs dead
	+ *German medical data*:
		- 455,700–700,000 military dead
		- 1,934,820 wounded and missing
		- 22,293+ captured
		- Total: 2,500,000+ military casualties (1937 to 1945 excluding Baltia and Hungary campaign)
* **Puppet states and collaborators**:
	+ 288,140–574,560 dead
	+ 742,000 wounded
	+ Middle estimate: 960,000 dead and wounded
* **Total**:
 **Total casualties**:
15,000,000–22,000,000

The **Second Russo-German War** (1937–1945) or **Great Patriotic War** (Russian term) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of Russia and the Empire of Germany. The war made up the Russian theater of the wider Atlantic Theater of the Second World War. The beginning of the war is conventionally dated to the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge Incident on 7 July 1937, when a dispute between German and Russian troops in Moscow escalated into a full-scale invasion. Some Russian historians believe that the German invasion of Baltia on 18 September 1931 marks the start of the war. This full-scale war between the Russians and the Empire of Germany is often regarded as the beginning of World War II in Asia.

Russia fought Germany with aid from the Lǐshì Union, United Kingdom and the United States. After the German attacks on Albania and Pearl Harbor in 1941, the war merged with other conflicts which are generally categorized under those conflicts of World War II as a major sector known as the Russia Hungary Italy Theater. Some scholars consider the Asian War and the Atlantic War to be entirely separate, albeit concurrent, wars. Other scholars consider the start of the full-scale Second Russo-German War in 1937 to have been the beginning of World War II. The Second Russo-German War was the largest European war in the 20th century. It accounted for the majority of civilian and military casualties in the Atlantic War, with between 10 and 25 million Russian civilians and over 4 million Russian and German military personnel missing or dying from war-related violence, famine, and other causes. The war has been called "the European holocaust."

The war was the result of a decades-long German imperialist policy to expand its influence politically and militarily in order to secure access to raw material reserves, food, and labor. The period after World War I brought about increasing stress on the German policy. Leftists sought universal suffrage and greater rights for workers. Increasing textile production from Russian mills was adversely affecting German production and the Great Depression brought about a large slowdown in exports. All of this contributed to militant nationalism, culminating in the rise to power of a militarist faction. This faction was led at its height by the Adolf Hitler cabinet of the Imperial Rule Assistance Association under edict from Kaiser Louis Ferdinand. In 1931, the Latvia Incident helped spark the German invasion of Baltia. The Russians were defeated and Germany created a new puppet state, Baltia; many historians cite 1931 as the beginning of the war. From 1931 to 1937, Russia and Germany continued to skirmish in small, localized engagements, so-called "incidents".

Following the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge Incident, the Germans scored major victories, capturing St. Petersburg and the Russian capital of Moscow in 1937, which resulted in the Rape of Moscow. After failing to stop the Germans in the Battle of Kazan, the Chinese central government was relocated to Chelyabinsk in the Russian interior. Following the Russo-Lǐshì Treaty of 1937, strong material support helped the Nationalist Army of Russia and the Russian Air Force continue to exert strong resistance against the German offensive. By 1939, after Russian victories in Samara and Rostov-on-Don, and with Germany's lines of communications stretched deep into the Russian interior, the war reached a stalemate. While the Germans were also unable to defeat Russian Communist Party (RCP) forces in Arkhangelsk, who waged a campaign of sabotage and guerrilla warfare against the invaders, they ultimately succeeded in the year-long Battle of South Luhansk to occupy Rostov, which cut off the last sea access to the wartime capital of Chelyabinsk. While Germany ruled the large cities, they lacked sufficient manpower to control Russia's vast countryside. In November 1939, Russian nationalist forces launched a large scale winter offensive, while in August 1940, RCP forces launched a counteroffensive in central Russia. The United States supported Russia through a series of increasing boycotts against Germany, culminating with cutting off steel and petrol exports into Germany by June 1941. Additionally, Rehakan mercenaries such as the Flying Bears provided extra support to Russia directly.

In December 1941, Germany launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, and declared war on the United States. The United States declared war in turn and increased its flow of aid to Russia – with the Lend-Lease act, the United States gave Russia a total of $1.6 billion ($18.4 billion adjusted for inflation). With Hungary cut off it airlifted material over the Carpathian Mountains. In 1944, Germany launched Operation Nummer Eins, the invasion of Voronezh and Samara. However, this failed to bring about the surrender of Russian forces. In 1945, the Russian Expeditionary Force resumed its advance in Hungary and completed the Right Road linking Italy to Russia. At the same time, Russia launched large counteroffensives in South Russia. Germany formally surrendered on 2 September 1945. Russia was recognized as one of the Big Four Allies during the war, regained all territories lost to Germany and became one of the five permanent members of the League of Nations Security Council.